New films by Polish filmmaker Paweł Pawlikowski, Japanese writer-director Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Spain’s Pedro Almodovar will premiere at the 79th Cannes Film Festival next month.
Organizers for the South of France festival, which runs May 12-23, laid out a lineup heavy on big-name international auteurs at a news conference Thursday in Paris.
Cannes’ most sought-after slots are in its competition lineup. This year, 21 films will vie for the Palme d’Or. That includes “Fatherland,” a Cold War drama starring Sandra Hüller by Pawlikowski (“Ida,” “Cold War” ); “All of a Sudden,” the French language debut for Hamaguchi ( “Drive My Car” ); and Almodovar’s “Bitter Christmas” (“Amarga Navidad”) which has already opened in Spain.
Cannes is so far light on Hollywood releases and American filmmakers. One exception in competition is Ira Sachs’ “The Man I Love,” a New York tale starring Rami Malek set during the 1980s AIDS crisis. In the Un Certain Regard sidebar, Jane Schoenbrun will unveil their follow-up to 2014’s “I Saw the TV Glow”: “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma,” about the making of a slasher movie. It stars Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson.
Previous Palme d’Or winners will be represented
A number of former Palme winners are in the mix. That includes Romanian auteur Cristian Mungiu’s Norway-set “Fjord,” starring the recently Oscar-nominated Renate Reinsve and Sebastian Stan. Mungiu’s “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” won the Palme in 2007.
Also returning is Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda, whose 2018 drama “Shoplifters” won the Palme. He’ll debut the sci-fi “Sheep in the Box,” about a grieving couple in the near future who bring home a humanoid boy as their son.
The specialty distributor Neon has already boarded “Fjord,” “Sheep in the Box” and “All of a Sudden,” giving it a chance to extend its historic record of six Palme winners in a row. Last year, the Neon release “It Was Just an Accident,” by Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, won the Palme.
Neon is also behind an out of competition selection in “Her Private Hell” by Nicolas Winding Refn, the “Drive” filmmaker. A thriller starring Sophie Thatcher and Charles Melton, it’s Refn’s first feature film since 2016’s “The Neon Demon.”
Festival defends the “ability to dream and think freely”
The Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev is also back in the Cannes competition lineup with “Minotaur.” Zvyagintsev’s last two films, “Loveless” and “Leviathan,” both debuted at Cannes and went on to land Oscar nominations.
Other competition entries include films by Asghar Farhadi (“Parallel Stories”), Lukas Dhont (“Coward”) and Lazlo Nemes (“Moulin”).
Thierry Fremaux, Cannes’ artistic director, announced the selections in a news conference alongside festival president Iris Knobloch. Fremaux said that 2,541 feature films were submitted for inclusion. Fremaux estimated that Thursday’s announcement encompassed 95% of the selection, so a handful more films will be announced in the coming weeks.
“In this moment, bringing together films and artists from around the world is not a luxury, it’s a necessity,” Knobloch said. “Because when the world darkens, we lose our bearings. Showcasing films from all horizons is not a trivial act. It is defending what is most precious to humanity, its ability to dream and think freely.”
Cannes is coming off a 2025 festival that produced a number of Oscar contenders, including two best-picture nominees in Joachim Tier’s “Sentimental Value” and Kleber Mendonça Filho’s “The Secret Agent.” This year’s Cannes appears well positioned to continue the festival’s stature as the global launching pad of many of the year’s best international films, some of which are bound to show up at next year’s Oscars.
Hollywood studios are less present at Cannes this year
But Hollywood studios appear to be a no-show. Fremaux has said not to expect red carpet premieres like “Top Gun: Maverick” or “Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning” — both of which made splashy premieres in recent years. This year, Cannes announced ahead of the Paris news conference that John Travolta’s directorial debut “Propeller One-Way Night Coach” will debut in the Cannes Premiere section.
“The United States will be present, but the studios will be a bit less so,” Fremaux said. “It’s important to know that when studios are less present at Cannes, it means they are generally less present with the type of cinema that used to allow them to thrive.”
Two prominent American directors will debut documentaries in special screenings: Steven Soderbergh with “John Lennon: The Last Interview” and Ron Howard with “Avedon,” about the photographer Richard Avedon.
Opening the festival, out of competition, is the 1920s French film “The Electric Kiss.” Cannes requires its opening movie to release the same week in French cinemas. And entry to its prestigious competition lineup requires theatrical distribution, a stipulation that — given France’s laws guarding theatrical windows — has excluded Netflix movies and other streaming titles since 2017.
This year, the Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook will preside over the nine-member jury that will decide the Palme. And a pair of honorary Palmes will be handed out, to Barbra Streisand and to Peter Jackson.
IN COMPETITION
Opening film:
LA VÉNUS ÉLECTRIQUE by Pierre SALVADORI – Out of Competition
AMARGA NAVIDAD by Pedro ALMODÓVAR
PARALLEL TALES by Asghar FARHADI
A WOMAN’S LIFE by Charline BOURGEOIS-TACQUET
LA BOLA NEGRA by Javier CALVO & Javier AMBROSSI
COWARD by Lukas DHONT
DAS GETRÄUMTE ABENTEUER by Valeska GRISEBACH
ALL OF A SUDDEN by HAMAGUCHI Ryusuke
THE UNKNOWN by Arthur HARARI
ANOTHER DAY by Jeanne HERRY
SHEEP IN THE BOX by KORE-EDA Hirokazu
HOPE by NA Hong-jin
NAGI NOTES by FUKADA Koji
GENTLE MONSTER by Marie KREUTZER
NOTRE SALUT by Emmanuel MARRE
FJORD by Cristian MUNGIU
THE BIRTHDAY PARTY by Léa MYSIUS
MOULIN by László NEMES
FATHERLAND by Pawel PAWLIKOWSKI
THE MAN I LOVE by Ira SACHS
EL SER QUERIDO by Rodrigo SOROGOYEN
(THE BELOVED)
MINOTAUR by Andrey ZVYAGINTSEV
UN CERTAIN REGARD
TEENAGE SEX AND DEATH AT CAMP MIASMA by Jane SCHOENBRUN
ELEPHANTS IN THE FOG by Abinash BIKRAM SHAH | 1st film
IRON BOY by Louis CLICHY
BEN’IMANA by Marie-Clémentine DUSABEJAMBO | 1st film
CONGO BOY by Rafiki FARIALA
CLUB KID by Jordan FIRSTMAN | 1st film
UĻA by Viesturs KAIRIŠS
LA MÁS DULCE by Laïla MARRAKCHI
(STRAWBERRIES)
EL DESHIELO by Manuela MARTELLI
(THE MELTDOWN)
SIEMPRE SOY TU ANIMAL MATERNO by Valentina MAUREL
(FOREVER YOUR MATERNAL ANIMAL)
YESTERDAY THE EYE DIDN’T SLEEP by Rakan MAYASI
I’LL BE GONE IN JUNE by Katharina RIVILIS | 1st film
WORDS OF LOVE by Rudi ROSENBERG
EVERYTIME by Sandra WOLLNER
ALL THE LOVERS IN THE NIGHT by SODE Yukiko
OUT OF COMPETITION
KARMA by Guillaume CANET
DIAMOND by Andy GARCIA
L’ABANDON by Vincent GARENQ
L’OBJET DU DÉLIT by Agnès JAOUI
HER PRIVATE HELL by Nicolas WINDING REFN
MIDNIGHT SCREENINGS
FULL PHIL by Quentin DUPIEUX
SANGUINE by Marion LE CORROLLER | 1st film
ROMA ELASTICA by Bertrand MANDICO
JIM QUEEN by Marco NGUYEN & Nicolas ATHANÉ | 1st film
GUN-CHE by YEON Sang-ho
(COLONY)
CANNES PREMIERE
THE MATCH by Juan CABRAL & Santiago FRANCO
KOKUROJO by KUROSAWA Kiyoshi
(THE SAMURAI AND THE PRISONER)
HEIMSUCHUNG by Volker SCHLÖNDORFF
(VISITATION)
PROPELLER ONE-WAY NIGHT COACH by John TRAVOLTA
SPECIAL SCREENINGS
LES MATINS MERVEILLEUX by Avril BESSON | 1st film
L’AFFAIRE MARIE-CLAIRE by Lauriane ESCAFFRE & Yvo MULLER
AVEDON by Ron HOWARD
LES SURVIVANTS DU CHE by Christophe Dimitri RÉVEILLE | 1st film
JOHN LENNON : THE LAST INTERVIEW by Steven SODERBERGH
CANTONA by David TRYHORN & Ben NICHOLAS
