Cannes’ Critics’ Week Reveals Lineup of Armenian Filmmakers Taking Part in Next Step Studio Program (EXCLUSIVE)

By Leo Barraclough

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Cannes Film Festival‘s Critics’ Week has revealed the participants of next year’s Next Step Studio program, which will focus on Armenia. The filmmakers taking part are Armik Israyelyan, Raffi Movsisyan, Sona Khachatryan and Naira Sargsyan.
Each of the four Armenian directors will be paired with an international filmmaker, and the filmmaking pairs will then develop and shoot a film each. The films will be shot in Yerevan in March 2027, filmed in the Armenian language, and produced with a fully Armenian cast and crew. The completed films will premiere at Critics’ Week in Cannes in 2027. They will be supported by the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports of the Republic of Armenia.

Israyelyan is an alumnus of the KinoEyes European Film Masters program and studied at the American University of Armenia. Before becoming a director, she worked as a videographer and media creator at UCRAFT. Israyelyan’s “The List” recently took home the best short film award at the Unica Annual Film Festival. She has participated in Erasmus+ film projects.

Movsisyan graduated from the Yerevan State Institute of Theater and Cinema in 2012, majoring in Film Studies in the master’s program.

From 2012 to 2017, he worked at the Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival as a coordinator of Armenian film programs. From 2018 to 2019, he served as an advisor to the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Armenia. Since 2018, he has been a coordinator of film programs at the Tumo Center for Creative Technologies.

He wrote and hosted the program “Unseen Cinema” on Channel One, and wrote and hosted a number of programs on the Bun TV channel. In 2021, he directed his debut short film “Homecoming,” which premiered in the competition program of the Krakow Intl. Film Festival. He is the producer of three animated films.

Khachatryan graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Film Directing from the Yerevan State Theatre and Film Institute in 2024, and in 2026 received her master’s degree in Film Art from the same institution. In 2021, she directed her first documentary film, “Ani From the Planet Namseki,” which was screened in Armenia as part of the “One Minute, One Shot” film festival.

In 2022–2023, her second documentary project, “Edge,” was selected for development by the Georgian multimedia platform “Chai Khana.” The film was created in collaboration with Chai Khana and was later screened at the Yerevan Short Film Festival, where it received the Festival Director’s Award and the EurasiaDoc Special Award. “Edge” was also showcased at Cinema Village in New York as part of the Socially Relevant Film Festival.

In 2024–2025, Khachatryan directed her first short fiction film, “Relic.” The project received the main cash prize at the pitching competition of the Yerevan State Theatre and Film Institute, as well as awards from Hoshkee Film and Armine Anda, Picartix Production, and Open Platform. It also received a Special Mention in the Short Cuts Nest competition at the Golden Apricot International Film Festival.

Currently, Khachatryan is developing her first feature fiction film, “Process.” The project was selected for the SolidArt program in Armenia and received a cash prize, as well as a Special Mention at the GAIFF Pro Project Market of the Golden Apricot Film Festival.

Sargsyan graduated from the Yerevan State Institute of Theater and Cinematography in the Feature Film Directing department in 2017. From 2007 to 2010, she did her Ph.D. in the same institute, and published various articles on cinema language and film structure. Her thesis dealt with Sound in Film Structure. She worked as an assistant director in Armenian public television and was the casting assistant to Maria Saakyan for her 2006 film “Mayak.” Her debut as a scriptwriter and director came with the 2020 short film “General Cleaning.” Her second short film, “The Eternal Red,” was released in 2025.

Following an open call for applications in Armenia, Next Step Studio received 25 submissions. A shortlist of 12 projects was drawn up, and the shortlisted filmmakers were interviewed on July 16 at the House of Cinema in Yerevan by a selection committee composed of Juliette Canon, Short Film Coordinator and Next Step Coordinator at Critics’ Week, French producer Dominique Welinski and Armenian producer Artyom Baghdasaryan.

The filmmaker pairings will be announced during the CineLink closing ceremony at Sarajevo Film Festival on Aug. 19.

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