GKIDS is bringing the hand-painted animated film “Chicken for Linda!” to select theaters nationwide. It will be released April 5 in New York City at the Angelika Film Center and April 12 in Los Angeles at the Laemmle Royal. Starting April 15, “Chicken for Linda!” will play in select additional theaters nationwide in its original French language.
Directed by husband-and-wife duo Chiara Malta and Sébastien Laudenbach, the film was an official Cannes selection in the ACID program. After a sold-out Work-in Progress session at the 2022 Annecy International Film Festival, it won the Annecy Grand Cristal in 2023. “Chicken for Linda!” also received both the Grand Prize and Audience Award at last year’s Animation Is Film Festival.
The official synopsis reads, “Paulette feels guilty after unjustly punishing her daughter Linda and would do anything to make it up to her. Linda immediately asks for a meal of chicken with peppers, which reminds her of the dish her father used to make. But with a general strike closing stores all across town and pushing people into the streets, this innocent request quickly leads to an outrageous series of events that spirals out of control, as Paulette does everything she can to keep her promise and find a chicken for Linda.”
In his review of the film, Variety’s Peter Debruge wrote that he “wouldn’t hesitate to call ‘Chicken for Linda!’ the best film of Cannes this year.” He furthered, “The movie feels spontaneous and unpredictable, like its protagonist, whom no one could fault for craving human connection and a way to process her loss. Who’d have thought the recipe for both might be so sweet?”