Shibboleth, the feature directorial debut of writer-director Alexandra Matheou (A Summer Place), has found its female lead in Greek actress Mary Mina (A Summer Place, TV series Aggeliki), who is known for having played the High Priestess during the Olympic Flame lighting ceremonies since 2024.
The drama is one of this year’s projects in Focus CoPro at Cannes, which selects first features at an early stage from filmmakers selected in the Cannes Film Festival‘s main short film competition section and shorts in the Directors’ Fortnight, as well as from other filmmakers scouted all year round.
The logline for Shibboleth reads: “A surrogate mother joins the couple expecting her baby on a vacation. As a love triangle quietly takes shape, she is confronted with the emotional cost of surrogacy and the realization that her job doesn’t always end at birth.”
On the Focus CoPro website, Matheou shares about the film: “The story unfolds in a place that seems to have defeated death; or so its people believe. For as long as I can remember, my existential anxiety around the subject matter of death has been a constant shadow. This is why I created a playground where I could ask: if eternal life were possible, would it actually make life better? Or would it unravel everything we think we know about living?”
Alexandra Matheou
Shibboleth is made with Cyprus support coming from the Cyprus Deputy Ministry of Culture, Maria Drandaki‘s Greek production company, Homemade Films, and France’s La Cellule Productions, with more partners to be announced soon. The project is in its financing and casting stage, with shooting planned for the summer of 2027 in Cyprus and Greece.
Matheou will world premiere her new short Free Eliza (Notes on an Anatomical Imperfection) on Thursday, May 20, in the Director’s Fortnight.
The short is about a woman born without the ability to smile. Eliza, who is a hotel worker, refuses to change herself “even as a world gripped by toxic positivity demands she conform,” according to a synopsis.
‘Free Eliza,’ courtesy of This Is The Girl Films
Courtesy of This Is The Girl Films
Homemade Films is a co-producer on Free Eliza and the main producer of this year’s Un Certain Regard film Titanic Ocean, directed by Konstantina Kotzamani.
THR can now premiere an exclusive clip from Free Eliza, which Matheou wrote and directed. Grigoria Metheniti stars as the titular Eliza. So, everyone, get ready for a staff photo! But how do you pose for a photo if you can’t smile? And get ready for mentions of dolphins and, yes, Pamela Anderson.
Watch the exclusive clip from Free Eliza here.
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