L'Alpe d'Huez (France) (AFP)

They dream of making cinema, or have already started. At the Alpe d'Huez comedy film festival, young youtubers rub shoulders with the world of the 7th Art, attentive to the new talents emerging on the web.

Aged 21 to 26, Florent and Faustine Koziel, Zoé Marchal and Tonio Life - whose real name is Alexandre Antonio - are the focus of the Festival this year, which highlights young people from the web, in partnership with the humorous creation studio Golden Mustache (group M6), launched in 2012.

The first three have created a web series, "Close Up", two seasons of which were broadcast on Youtube, with nearly 70 million views. They recount in a raw way the life of young girls today, and together made a short film.

A 23-year-old videographer discovered on Vine before launching herself on Facebook and Instagram, Tonio Life has for her part co-produced her web series "Overflowing", each episode of which has been viewed 1 million times. Today, whoever says he admires Omar Sy and Louis de Funès took his first steps in cinema in "Walter" by Varante Soudjian (2019).

For these young people, being exposed at a festival that welcomes comedy stars like Dany Boon is an opportunity to be noticed by the 7th Art.

"There are young people who meet the profession, they finance their films. There are projects which start at Alpe d'Huez", explains Frédéric Cassoly, director of the Festival.

- From Mister V to Hakim Jemili -

Certain web talents are even selected in competition, such as Justine Le Pottier ("Les Emmerdeurs" on Youtube), which this year presents one of the ten short films in the running. Or Arnaud Mizzon, also present with a short film, which started on the internet with web series ("Les CDD", "En coloc").

Actress Alison Wheeler, revealed on the internet with the comedian collective Studio Bagel (Canal +), plays for her part in one of the feature films in competition, "Forte" by Katia Lewkowicz, after notably "Gaston Lagaffe".

Many youtubers have already ventured onto the big screen in recent years, from Mister V ("Public place") to Norman ("Alibi.com"), Hugo alone ("Avis de mistral"), Andy tells ("Daddy Cool ") or Hakim Jemili of the collective Woop Gang, preselected as best hope at the Césars for" Doctor? ", In which he plays with Michel Blanc.

Because with some 300 French channels which passed the milestone of a million subscribers in June, the YouTube platform, owned by Google, essential for television channels, has also become a breeding ground for talent for the cinema.

It is particularly so for humor, which is very present and professional there, while Youtube launched in 2018 its first French series, produced by Studio Bagel and Golden Mustache.

- "catalog" -

"People perceive Youtube differently from year to year. It evolves a lot. When we were teenagers, it was really only dogs and puppies filmed in fisheye" (very wide angle lens), recalls Florent Koziel.

Today, "we put ourselves in cinema conditions, we take the time to shed light, to choose the right material", he continues. "It becomes a database I think for producers and distributors".

For the director of Golden Mustache Younes Nemiche, who wants to "detect the stars of tomorrow", "we must also be curious about all platforms", like Tik Tok, a social network appreciated by adolescents, where "extremely creative things happen" today.

Does success on the internet promise a career on the big screen? Nothing is less certain, especially since the cinema industry regularly continues to harbor a certain distrust of Youtubers, snipers often trained outside the codes of the 7th Art.

"When one arrives in the cinema by being cataloged as Youtubeur, it is rather complicated to leave this image", testifies Tonio Life.

"Unfortunately, they don't trust us too much people ...", Hakim Jemili also regretted recently. "French cinema too often does without Youtubeurs".

© 2020 AFP