Director of 2017 Cannes Critics’ Week short film winner “The Disinherited,” Laura Ferrés will direct her awaited feature debut “The Permanent Picture,” which is a co-production between Barcelona-based Fasten Films and Le Bureau, based out of Paris and London.

International sales will be handled by The Bureau Sales, the sales arm of the French-British label.

A sort of “depressing comedy” – according to Ferrés – “The Permanent Picture” follows middle-aged Carmen, a casting director whose world collapses when her boss retires and the production company she works for takes a dramatic turn. Carmen will be forced to participate in a campaign for a corrupted party.

Selected by Variety as a Spanish talent to track, Ferrés studied at Barcelona’s prestigious Escac film school. She developed her feature debut script at the Next Step Program, a workshop created by Cannes’ Critics’ Week, The TorinoFilmLab and the Moulin d’Ande screenwriting support program.

“The feature will question the promises of personal fulfillment through work, as well as the construction of our present through politics and its images,” said Ferrés, who found inspiration for her feature debut in her years working as a casting director in the advertising sector.

Aki Kaurismäki, Jacques Tati, Karen Ade’s “Toni Erdmann” and Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll’s  “Whisky” were inspirations for the film’s deadpan comedic tone, she added.

“What’s amazing in ‘The Disinherited’ is how Laura explored deep issues in a very simple way, and also with humor and affection and string visual concepts which may define her idea of cinema,” said Adrià Monés at Fasten Films the company behind David Ilundain’s “One for All” and Justin Webster’s “The Prosecutor, the President and the Spy.”

Le Bureau productions include Jessica Hausner’s “Little Joe” and Andrew Haigh’s “45 Years.” The Bureau Sales handles more than 600 titles including Celluloid Dreams’ and Rezo Films’ libraries.

Agnés Piqué,  the cinematographer of “The Disinherited,” will re-team with Ferrés on her feature debut.

Cast is still to be determined. Shooting is scheduled to begin next year.

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