When Wonder Speaks Every Language: Highlights from 12 Countries at our 15th Edition

From Tehran to Paris, from Astana to Pondichéry — the 15th Festival du Film Merveilleux screened films from 12 countries across five continents, proving once again that imagination knows no borders.

In Out of Tune (Iran), a street whistler’s daily routine is upended by a single unexpected request — a gentle reminder that human connection lives in the smallest encounters. A Drop of Dew (China) transforms a forest into a poetic dreamscape where a drop of water chases its own shadow. From Kazakhstan and Russia, Son tells the story of a boy in a wheelchair whose world is transformed by a television broadcast about a Mars rover — wonder as a gateway to possibility. And in La Valse du Printemps (Italy), two street artists separated by a wall refuse to let borders contain their love.

Picture from the short film A drop of Dew.

These films sat alongside works from France, Belgium, Spain, the United States, Germany, Benin, South Korea and Russia — a programme that reflects the festival’s founding belief: wonder is a universal language of cultural dialogue.

Since 2010, the Festival du Film Merveilleux has screened in 36 partner countries through collaborations with Alliance Française, French Institutes and international cultural centres. In September 2025, the festival expanded to India for the first time, with a special screening programme at Alliance Française Pondichéry.