“Minotaur” wins the Grand Prix at Cannes and represents France at the Oscars
Andrei Zviaguintsev’s political thriller Minotaur, a remake of The Unfaithful Wife, explores a family in crisis amid Russian tensions.
Minotaur, Grand Prix winner of the Cannes Film Festival, represents France at the Oscars. The film marks the return of Andrei Zviaguintsev after his long Covid-19 ordeal that left him in an artificial coma for several weeks, and his exile from Russia following the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. First treated in Germany, then in France, the director chose to leave his homeland to protest against the government. He returns with a political thriller that depicts a family in crisis, caught between moral dilemmas and mobilization. According to AlloCiné, Minotaur is a remake of The Unfaithful Wife by Claude Chabrol, to which Zviaguintsev added contemporary stakes such as mobilization and the youth exodus. The filmmaker aims to fill the “gaps” of the original text and anchor the story in the current Russian context.