The Cannes Film Festival 2026 has concluded with a refreshingly understated edition, favoring global auteurs over Hollywood glitz. While past years launched blockbusters like Rocketman and Top Gun: Maverick, this year's A-list was limited to James Gray's middling gangster film Paper Tiger, starring Miles Teller and Adam Driver. Scarlett Johansson notably skipped the premiere and ignored Gray's call during the standing ovation.
Top Prize Winners
Cristian Mungiu's Fjord won the Palme d'Or, continuing his exploration of taboo subjects. The film stars Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve as Romanian Evangelicals in Norway, clashing with locals after child abuse accusations. Andrey Zvyagintsev's Minotaur took the Grand Prix, his first film since surviving Covid and exiling himself from Russia. Set during the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russia has vowed never to screen it.
Our Top 8 Picks
All of a Sudden ★★★★☆
Ryusuke Hamaguchi's gentle epic follows a care home director (Virginie Efira) whose innovative scheme faces opposition. A chance encounter with a theatre director (Tao Okamoto) leads to a night shift that becomes the film's centerpiece. At 196 minutes, it flies by, with Efira and Okamoto winning joint Best Actress. A masterclass in symbiotic performance.
Everytime ★★★★★
Austrian filmmaker Sandra Wollner's Everytime won Un Certain Regard. This metaphysical head-scratcher blurs reality and fiction after an unspeakable tragedy, prompting viewers to draw their own conclusions. Described as Lynchian Aftersun, it dares you to re-tie the narrative bow in different ways. The best film at Cannes and possibly all year.
Fatherland ★★★★☆
Paweł Pawlikowski completes a loose triptych with Ida and Cold War. Set in 1949, it follows Nobel laureate Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler) and his daughter Erika (Sandra Hüller) on a road trip through divided Germany. Shot in black-and-white, it is austere and tender, anchored by one of the year's best performances. Pawlikowski won a shared Best Director prize.
Hope ★★★★☆
Na Hong-jin returns with a creature feature set in a mountain town near the Korean DMZ. Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander are unrecognizable beneath CGI. A local police chief and his deputy face an invasion with rifles ill-equipped to handle. At 165 minutes, it overstays its welcome but moves with vim. Bold and breathlessly kinetic, making Hollywood look timid.
I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning ★★★★☆
Clio Barnard's only British fiction film at Cannes follows five childhood friends from a Birmingham council estate. With unflinching honesty, it captures working-class lives, featuring standout performances, especially Jay Lycurgo as a wayward drug dealer. Adapted from Keiran Goddard's novel, it pulses to The Streets' rhythms. Any tears are thoroughly earned.
La Bola Negra ★★★★☆
Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi's sweeping Spanish epic earned a 20-minute standing ovation. Netflix won the bidding war for this weepie exploring three gay men across 80 years. Based on an unfinished work by Federico García Lorca, its non-linear storytelling adds edge to a musty melodrama. Expect serious Oscar buzz.
Tangles ★★★★☆
Sarah Leavitt's graphic novel adaptation follows a young woman returning home after her mother's Alzheimer's diagnosis. Produced by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, this 2D animation finds time for laughs with voice cast Abi Jacobsen, Bryan Cranston, and Samira Wiley. Pixar hasn't been this creative in years. An essential, cathartic experience.
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma ★★★★★
Jane Schoenbrun's finest work is a psychosexually charged meta-horror and pastiche of Eighties slashers. Hannah Einbinder plays a queer filmmaker rebooting a franchise, tracking down its original star (Gillian Anderson, wielding a Southern drawl). Warmer, wilder, and funnier than I Saw the TV Glow, it's a story of desire finding itself in the dark. Surrender to it.
