Check out the trailer for the acclaimed film Coward.
Starring Emmanuel Macchia and Valentin Campagne, the film follows two young Belgian soldiers whose relationship blossoms amid the brutality of the trenches during World War I. Along the way, drag performance offers them an unexpected escape from the horrors surrounding them.
The film received a rousing reception at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, with Macchia and Campagne jointly winning the festival’s Best Actor prize. Before filming Coward, Macchia had no formal acting experience or training and was studying landscape architecture when he was cast.
The story follows a group of soldiers tasked with entertaining fellow troops against the backdrop of a devastating conflict. With no women present, the young men perform in drag, creating brief moments of joy for those serving on the front line.
In an interview, director Luka Dhont shared that the project was inspired by a photograph he discovered in a Paris bookstore.
“I came across a black-and-white photo inside a book in a bookstore in Paris. It showed men dancing on a stage, and when I looked closely, I saw that they were wearing skirts made from sandbags and jewellery made from old ammunition.
“When I began talking to historians about it, they told me that since the dawn of time, in every army, men waiting to return to the front lines have turned the tools of destruction into art as a way of escaping their reality, even if only for a moment. I was seeing these images for the first time, and it inspired me to explore them as part of a project about memory.”
Dhont previously directed Girl (2018), which won the Camera d’Or and the Queer Palm at the 71st Cannes Film Festival, and Close, which won the Grand Prix at the 75th Cannes Film Festival and the Sydney Film Prize at the 69th Sydney Film Festival. Much of his work explores queer experiences.
Coward has been selected by Belgium as its submission for the Best International Feature Film category at the 99th Academy Awards in 2027.
