Champs-Élysées Film Festival : 7 of the Best Indie Documentaries Coming Out Soon!
Every June, the Champs-Élysées Film Festival brings together an exceptional selection of premiering independent cinema and sharp musical curation from France and the United States, to Paris’ iconic avenue.
A bridge between French and American filmmaking, the festival grants particular importance to young artists and has in recent years impressed with its cutting edge documentary selections. With an eye for experimental cinema, from fiction to non-fiction and everything in-between, this year’s films blur the lines between what’s real and what’s not, explore identity through love and landscape and examine the destructive consequences of modern capitalist society on our land and our minds.
Here are 7 indie documentaries we recommend, that are premiering at this year’s edition of the Champs-Elysées Film Festival, from the 17th to the 23rd of June 2025 !
We also suggest checking out this year’s fantastic short film competitions (French competition ; US competition), featuring new documentaries by fleuryfontaine, Nicolas Gourault and Christopher Radcliff that we’re particularly excited about.
1. Pavements by Alex Ross Perry
Avant-premieres and Special screenings
In his latest film, Alex Ross Perry turns his attention to the iconic, genre-defying 90s rock band Pavement by innovatively distorting the music documentary format.
Pavements is an ambitious ode to “the world’s most important and influential band” that blends 2022 footage as they prepare for their first concerts in 12 years in the fall of 2022, an off-Broadway stage musical “Slanted! Enchanted!” starring Michael Esper, Zoe Lister-Jones and Kathryn Gallagher, a gallery show “Pavements 33-22” set up like the Whitney Museum where some of the band’s members once worked as security guards and a shameless awards bait biopic “Range Life,” with members of the band to be played by Joe Keery, Nat Wolff, Griffin Newman, Logan Miller and Fred Hechinger.
The result, which will be coming to Mubi in most countries this summer, is sure to delight diehard fans as much as it will intrigue newcomers.
2. My Heart Beats For No One by Diane Sara Bouzgarrou
Medium-length Competition
Riccardo is fascinated by infamous serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer. He recognizes himself in this man, a homosexual like himself, for whom he feels a love that he has never felt in his own life. The filmmaker travels with Riccardo to Milwaukee, the city where Dahmer committed his murders, to film him as reality puts his fantasy and their friendship to the test.
A docu-fiction that twists and blurs the lines between reality and drama.
For those in France, it will be available on Arte from the 28th of June.
Mon cœur ne bat pour personne by Diane Sara Bouzgarrou
3. To Use a Mountain by Casey Carter
US Feature Film Competition
In 1982, six rural communities across the United States were notified that all of the nation’s nuclear waste might be buried beneath them forever. Each candidate site was studied in detail by the Department of Energy’s scientists and bureaucrats, in a process met with distress and resistance. A compelling indictment that interweaves physics, geology and democracy.
To Use a Mountain was also selected at Visions du Réel in the International Feature Film Competition.
4. Khmerica by Thibaut Amri, Antoine Guide and Lucas Sénécaut
Medium-length Competition
Joker, Kookie and Djumbo are “Khmericans”: Cambodian refugees who grew up in the United States and were deported back to Cambodia after serving a prison sentence. We follow this trio in their daily lives, as they reunite with their new Khmer families, oscillating between the vestiges of a vanished life and a future yet to be built.
Khmerica was also selected at Visions du Réel in the International Feature Film Competition.
Khmerica by Thibaut Amri, Antoine Guide and Lucas Sénécaut
5. +10K by Gala Hernández López
Medium-length Competition Selection
Pol is 21 and lives with his grandmother. He dreams of living in Miami and generating +10k a month. He attends personal development events, follows online coaches and invests in cryptocurrencies. Pol doesn’t know when he’ll reach his goals of becoming the best version of himself. The only thing he knows is that one day, he’ll get there.
Fresh from its selection at the Directors’ Fortnight in May, +10K is one of the few documentaries that was shown at the Festival de Cannes this year ! You can read our full list of documentaries that were selected in here.
6. La Peau dure by Laïs Decaster
French Feature Film Competition
“Lola and I often think about the 15 years we spent together in our judo club in Argenteuil. It was an intense life made up of great joys but also sacrifices. Every year, we go back to the French Championships to see today's judokas. That's when I saw Blandine, whose features reminded me of Lola's. I wondered how she managed to be a top-level judoka while living her life as a young woman. I decided to go and meet her.”
La Peau dure by Laïs Decaster
7. Au Bain des dames by Margaux Fournier
Medium-length Competition
Every day, Joëlle joins her retired friends on the beach at Bain des Dames in Marseille. As if in an open-air theatre, they laugh, talk about love, sex and changing bodies, and remake the world with the freedom of those who have nothing left to prove.
Au Bain des dames by Margaux Fournier
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