Kristen Stewart was always ready to direct

CANNES, France (AP) — Kristen Stewart has been talking about directing as long as she’s been acting. Not many people encouraged it.

“I spoke to other actors when I was really little because I was always like: ‘I want to direct movies!’” Stewart recalls. “I was fully set down by several people who were like, ‘Why?’ and ‘No.’ It’s such a fallacy that you need to have an unbelievable tool kit or some kind of credential. It really is if you have something to say, then a movie can fall out of you very elegantly.”

You wouldn’t necessarily say that Stewart’s feature directing debut, “The Chronology of Water,” elegantly fell out of her at the Cannes Film Festival. She arrived in Cannes after a frantic rush to complete the film, an adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s 2011 memoir, starring Imogen Poots. Sitting on a balcony overlooking the Croisette, Stewart says she finished the film “30 seconds before I got on an airplane.”

“It was eight years in the making and then a really accelerated push. It’s an obvious comparison but it was childbirth,” says Stewart. “I was pregnant for a really long time and then I was screaming bloody murder.”

Yet however dramatic was the arrival of “The Chronology of Water,” it was emphatic. The film, an acutely impressionistic portrait of a brutal coming of age, is the evident work of an impassioned filmmaker. Stewart, the director, turns out to be a lot like Stewart, the actor: intensely sensitive, ferociously felt.

For Stewart, the accomplishment of “The Chronology of Water,” which is playing in the sidebar Un Certain Regard and is up for sale in Cannes, was also a revelation about the mythology of directing.

“It’s a such a male f------ thing,” she says. “It’s really not fair for people to think it’s hard to make a movie insofar as you need to know things before going into it. There are technical directors, but, Jesus Christ, you hire a crew. You just have a perspective and trust it.”

“My inexperience made this movie.”

Stewart’s first steps as a director came eight years ago with the short “Come Swim,” which she also premiered in Cannes, in 2017. The festival, she says, generates the kind of questions she likes around movies. It was around then that Stewart began adapting Yuknavitch's memoir.

In it, Yuknavitch recounts her life, starting with sexual abuse from her father (an architect played by Michael Epp in the film). Competitive swimming is one of her only escapes, and it helps get her away from home and into college. Blissful freedom, self-lacerating addiction and trauma color her years from there, as does an inspirational writing experience with Ken Kesey (Jim Belushi in the film). Stewart calls the book “a lifesaver — like, actually, a flotation device.”

“The book was this call to arms invitation to listen to your own voice, which, if you’re walking around in a girl body, is really hard to do,” says Stewart. “It fragments in a way that feels truer to my internal experience than anything I’ve ever read.”

“I really wanted to make something that wasn’t about what happened to this person, it’s about what she did with what happens to her, and what writing can do for you,” adds Stewart. “It’s like the most meta, crazy experience to have also cracked myself open at the same time.”

That goes for Poots, too, the 35-year-old British actor who, in “The Chronology of Water,” gives one of her finest, most wide-ranging performances.

“It’s Lydia’s life story and the cards that were dealt her, but in terms of the reactive nature, that’s the female experience,” says Poots. “How you’re surveilled, how you’re supposed to respond, conform, how that’s repulsive, and how you sabotage something good — all of these things are just very, very female.”

Together, Stewart and Poots have been clearly bonded by the experience. Stewart calls Poots “a sibling now.” In Stewart’s best experiences with directors, she says, it becomes such a back-and-forth exchange that the separate jobs disintegrate, and, she says, “You’re kind of sharing a body.”

“But I’m positive I said nothing useful to her ever, and I talked way too much,” says Stewart. Poots immediately disagrees: “That’s not true, Kristen!”

“Kristen is incredibly present but at the same has this ability, like a plant or something, to pick up on a slight shift in the atmosphere where it’s like: ‘Wait a minute,’” Poots says, causing Stewart to laugh. “There is this insane brain at play and it’s a skill set that comes in the form of an intense curiosity.”

That curiosity, now, includes directing more movies. “The Chronology of Water” may signal not just a new chapter for one of American movies’ most intrepid actors, but an ongoing artistic evolution.

“Our production was a shipwreck, so basically we had to put the boat back together,” Stewart says of the editing process. That reassembling, Stewart believes helped make “The Chronology of Water” something less predetermined, where “the emotional, neurological tissue that occurred between images was real.”

“There was no way to make this movie under more normal circumstances,” says Stewart, “because then it would have been more normal.”

Jake Coyle has covered the Cannes Film Festival since 2012. He’s seeing approximately 40 films at this year’s festival and reporting on what stands out.

For more coverage of the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, visit https://apnews.com/hub/cannes-film-festival.

Thora Birch, from left, Imogen Poots, director Kristen Stewart and Kim Gordon pose for photographers at the photo call for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Friday, May 16, 2025. (Photo by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP)

Kristen Stewart, left, and Imogen Poots pose for portrait photographs for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Saturday, May 17, 2025. (Photo by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP)

Kristen Stewart, left, and Imogen Poots pose for portrait photographs for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Saturday, May 17, 2025. (Photo by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP)

Director Kristen Stewart poses for photographers at the photo call for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Friday, May 16, 2025. (Photo by Scott A Garfitt/Invision/AP)

Kristen Stewart poses for photographers upon arrival at the premiere of the film 'Bono: Stories of Surrender' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Friday, May 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Thora Birch, from left, director Kristen Stewart, and Imogen Poots pose for photographers at the photo call for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Friday, May 16, 2025. (Photo by Scott A Garfitt/Invision/AP)

Director Kristen Stewart poses for photographers at the photo call for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Friday, May 16, 2025. (Photo by Scott A Garfitt/Invision/AP)

Kristen Stewart, left, and Imogen Poots pose for portrait photographs for the film 'The Chronology of Water' at the 78th international film festival, Cannes, southern France, Saturday, May 17, 2025. (Photo by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP)

HOUSTON (AP) — Former Uvalde, Texas, schools police Officer Adrian Gonzales was among the first officers to arrive at Robb Elementary after a gunman opened fire on students and teachers.

Prosecutors allege that instead of rushing in to confront the shooter, Gonzales failed to take action to protect students. Many families of the 19 fourth-grade students and two teachers who were killed believe that if Gonzales and the nearly 400 officers who responded had confronted the gunman sooner instead of waiting more than an hour, lives might have been saved.

More than 3½ years since the killings, the first criminal trial over the delayed law enforcement response to one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history is set to begin.

It’s a rare case in which a police officer could be convicted for allegedly failing to act to stop a crime and protect lives.

Here’s a look at the charges and the legal issues surrounding the trial.

Gonzales was charged with 29 counts of child endangerment for those killed and injured in the May 2022 shooting. The indictment alleges he placed children in “imminent danger” of injury or death by failing to engage, distract or delay the shooter and by not following his active shooter training. The indictment says he did not advance toward the gunfire despite hearing shots and being told where the shooter was located.

Each child endangerment count carries a potential sentence of up to two years in prison.

State and federal reviews of the shooting cited cascading problems in law enforcement training, communication, leadership and technology and questioned why officers from multiple agencies waited so long before confronting and killing the gunman, Salvador Ramos.

Gonzales’ attorney, Nico LaHood, said his client is innocent and public anger over the shooting is being misdirected.

“He was focused on getting children out of that building,” LaHood, said. “He knows where his heart was and what he tried to do for those children.”

Jury selection in Gonzales’ trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 5 in Corpus Christi, about 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Uvalde. The trial was moved after defense attorneys argued Gonzales could not receive a fair trial in Uvalde.

Gonzales, 52, and former Uvalde schools police chief Pete Arredondo are the only officers charged. Arredondo was charged with multiple counts of child endangerment and abandonment. His trial has not been scheduled, and he is also seeking a change of venue.

Prosecutors have not explained why only Gonzales and Arredondo were charged. Uvalde County District Attorney Christina Mitchell did not respond to a request for comment.

It’s “extremely unusual” for an officer to stand trial for not taking an action, said Sandra Guerra Thompson, a University of Houston Law Center professor.

“At the end of the day, you’re talking about convicting someone for failing to act and that’s always a challenge,” Thompson said, “because you have to show that they failed to take reasonable steps.”

Phil Stinson, a criminal justice professor at Bowling Green State University who maintains a nationwide database of roughly 25,000 cases of police officers arrested since 2005, said a preliminary search found only two similar prosecutions.

One involved a Florida sheriff’s deputy, Scot Peterson, who was charged after the 2018 Parkland school massacre for allegedly failing to confront the shooter — the first such prosecution in the U.S. for an on-campus shooting. He was acquitted by a jury in 2023.

The other was the 2022 conviction of former Baltimore police officer Christopher Nguyen for failing to protect an assault victim. The Maryland Supreme Court overturned that conviction in July, ruling prosecutors had not shown Nguyen had a legal duty to protect the victim.

The justices in Maryland cited a prior U.S. Supreme Court decision on the public duty doctrine, which holds that government officials like police generally owe a duty to the public at large rather than to specific individuals unless a special relationship exists.

Michael Wynne, a Houston criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor not involved in the case, said securing a conviction will be difficult.

“This is clearly gross negligence. I think it’s going to be difficult to prove some type of criminal malintent,” Wynne said.

But Thompson, the law professor, said prosecutors may nonetheless be well positioned.

“You’re talking about little children who are being slaughtered and a very long delay by a lot of officers,” she said. “I just feel like this is a different situation because of the tremendous harm that was done to so many children.”

Associated Press writer Jim Vertuno in Austin, Texas, contributed.

Follow Juan A. Lozano: https://x.com/juanlozano70

FILE - Flowers are placed around a welcome sign outside Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, May 25, 2022, to honor the victims killed in a shooting at the school. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)

Velma Lisa Duran, sister of Robb Elementary teacher Irma Garcia, cries as she reflects on the 2022 Uvalde, Texas, school shooting during an interview on Dec. 19, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Kin Man Hui)

Velma Lisa Duran, sister of Robb Elementary teacher Irma Garcia, poses with photos of her sister and brother-in-law, Joe Garcia, as she reflects on the 2022 Uvalde, Texas, school shooting on Dec. 19, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Kin Man Hui)

FILE - This booking image provided by the Uvalde County, Texas, Sheriff's Office shows Adrian Gonzales, a former police officer for schools in Uvalde, Texas. (Uvalde County Sheriff's Office via AP, File)

FILE - Crosses with the names of shooting victims are placed outside Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, May 26, 2022. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)