Films by Almodovar, Pawlikowski and Hamaguchi lead an auteur-heavy
Cannes Film Festival lineup
[April 10, 2026]
By JAKE COYLE
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,” 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.
[to top of second column]
|
This image released by Sony Pictures Classics shows Bárbara Lennie,
left, and Victoria Luengo in a scene from "Bitter Christmas." (Sony
Pictures Classics via AP)
 “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.
All contents © copyright 2026 Associated Press. All rights reserved
 |
