Thomas Cailley

After study­ing Polit­i­cal Sci­ence and a brief stint in doc­u­men­tary pro­duc­tion, Thomas Cail­ley enrolled in the screen­writ­ing depart­ment at La Fémis. In 2010, he direct­ed Paris Shang­hai, a short film that won awards at numer­ous inter­na­tion­al film fes­ti­vals. His debut fea­ture, Love at First Fight (2014), was pre­sent­ed at Cannes Direc­tors’ Fort­night, and went on to win the Louis Del­luc Award for Best First Film. It received nine César nom­i­na­tions and won three: Best First Film, Best Actress for Adèle Haenel, and Most Promis­ing Actor for Kévin Aza­ïs. In 2018, Thomas Cail­ley direct­ed his first series, Ad Vitam, which was broad­cast on Arte, select­ed for the Toron­to Film Fes­ti­val and won Best French Series at Series Mania. In 2023, he direct­ed the eco­log­i­cal fable The Ani­mal King­dom, co-writ­ten with Pauline Munier, which opened the Un Cer­tain Regard sec­tion at the Cannes Film Fes­ti­val. Led by Romain Duris, Paul Kircher, Adèle Exar­chopou­los, Tom Merci­er and Bil­lie Blain, the film was a hit with both audi­ences and crit­ics, notably win­ning the Louis Del­luc Award for Best French Film, as well as receiv­ing 11 César nom­i­na­tions and five wins. Thomas Cail­ley, for his part, won the Lumière Award for Best Director.