The Hungarian-German-Swedish film White God will be in competition at this year’s Cannes Film Festival in the prestigious Un Certain Regard section. It is one of two films with Swedish connections in the section, following the announcement that Ruben Östlund’s Force Majeure will be taking part.

Kornél Mundruczo’s new feature White God begins with a vote in the Hungarian parliament to adopt a change to the laws on dog ownership. 337 members vote for the change and only one against. The change gives local authorities across Hungary the right to impose a special tax on dogs which are not of Hungarian origin. A true story? No matter, it could be true. White God is a story about race-related conflict, about ethnic cleansing.

Made with support funding from Eurimages, the film is a co-production between producers from Hungary, Germany and Sweden. Original production work was done in Hungary, with post-production input from Germany and Sweden, where the film was awarded production funding from the Swedish Film Institute through the Feature Film Commissioner Suzanne Glansborg.

“Pan-European collaborations are one of the most exciting development areas in the film industry right now, and we’re delighted that a Swedish co-production will be competing alongside Ruben Östlund,” says Anna Serner, CEO of the Swedish Film Institute.

Previous Swedish films have been Christopher’s House by Lars Lennart Forsberg (1980), The Serpent’s Way (1987) by Bo Widerberg, The Ox by Sven Nykvist (1990), Private Confessions by Liv Ullmann (1997), In the Presence of a Clown by Ingmar Bergman (1998), the Danish-Swedish Katinka by Max von Sydow (1999), You the Living by Roy Andersson (2007) and Ruben Östlund’s Involuntary (2008).

Internationally acclaimed directors who have competed in Un Certain Regard include Xavier Dolan, Sofia Coppola, Claire Denis, Gus Van Sant, Abbas Kiarostami, Richard Linklater, Steve McQueen, Jean-Luc Godard, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Jafar Panahi, François Ozon, Joachim Trier, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Samira Makhmalbaf and many more.

Stockholm, 5 May 2014

White God. Photo: Sandor Fegyverneki.