One of the talking points around the Cannes Film Festival’s 2026 edition is the absence of big U.S. studio titles making their way to the French Riviera this year.
The U.S. is represented instead by Ira Sachs’ The Man I Love in Competition; Jane Schoenbrun’s Teenage Sex and Death At Camp Miasma and Jordan Firstman’s Club Kid in Un Certain Regard; Andy Garcia’s Diamond Out of Competition; John Travolta’s Propeller One-Way Night Coach in Cannes Premiere; and Special Screenings for Steven Soderbergh’s John Lennon: The Last Interview and Ron Howard’s Avedon. Expectations are high that James Gray’s Paper Tiger could still make the cut.
Talking with Deadline after the announcement of the bulk of the 2026 Official Selection in Paris on Thursday, Cannes boss Thierry Frémaux suggested this year’s trend was a reflection of the current state of Hollywood but that he expects the studio execs to be out in force at the festival even if their films are not present.
#CannesFilmFestival boss Thierry Frémaux on the absence of U.S. studio titles in this year’s lineup, the current state of Hollywood and the success of ‘Anora’ at the Academy Awards as an indie film.
“The last five, 10 years were very quiet,” he said, referring to film… pic.twitter.com/LeFEB4tQro
— Deadline (@DEADLINE) April 9, 2026
“We’ll have a lot of studios because … Cannes is the big meeting point of world cinema, so the American studios are around,” he said. “We talk to them … there are some people I have known for many, many years. We have a lot of American filmmakers. There is an American cinema out of the studio system, out of the studio world.”
Frémaux pointed to the challenges facing L.A. over the past five years, from the Covid pandemic to the writers and actors’ strikes and the wildfires.
“I’m not sure the last five, 10 years were very quiet,” he said, referring to film production. “And while you’re not quiet, it’s complicated to come to Cannes. It’s complicated to greenlight big films.
“Of course, I feel nostalgic for that golden age when studios used to produce a lot of films, every month, auteur films … for what American cinema and what the studio system was,” he added. “My generation, we grew up loving cinema and loving cinema was loving American cinema. I missed those moments but it’s only this year … two years ago, we had Tom Cruise and Paramount [Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning]. We had Warner. Warner is the most faithful studio for Cannes.
“We had Sony Columbia … Tom Rothman, we talk very often,” he continued, referring to the chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s Motion Picture Group. “Tom is someone who is really thinking about the future, about cinemas, movie theatre, platforms and so on.”
Frémaux said Cannes remained relevant for U.S. cinema, pointing to the Palme d’Or win for Sean Baker’s Anora in 2024 ahead of its triumph at the Oscars the following year.
“It’s complicated to separate American cinema, with the studio on one side and independent cinema on the other side. We’ll see. To do an analysis of what cinema is and what Cannes is and what American cinema is, you need half decade.”
The success of Cannes-selected films at the Academy Awards continued this year with last year’s Grand Jury Prize winner Sentimental Value clinching the Best International Feature Film Oscar in March, while another three titles from the 2025 edition made it to the nomination stage.
#CannesFilmFestival boss Thierry Frémaux on the success of Cannes films at the Oscars and if he thinks this year’s lineup will be the same: “Who could guess the destiny of ‘Anora?’ I loved the movie. I put it in competition. But it was impossible to imagine that the film could… pic.twitter.com/d5aO8j8mF2
— Deadline (@DEADLINE) April 9, 2026
Asked if he thought his 2026 selection would yield a similar Oscar vintage, Frémaux replied: “Who could guess the destiny of Anora? I loved the movie. I put it in competition. But it was impossible to imagine that the film could have such a destiny. The same for Anatomy of a Fall.”
“Those films were transformed exactly like the Joachim Trier, like Sirāt, like The Secret Agent and so on … they are transformed by the look which comes from the audience, from the professionals and from the critics.”
“That is quite exciting for me and my colleagues. We have a list of films. we know the movies, what we like or not… But it’s very interesting what will be the reception in Cannes and then what will be from Cannes, the road to the Academy.”
Frémaux suggested that it was nothing new for Cannes titles to find Oscar glory – citing Clint Eastwood’s Mystic River as an example – but acknowledged it was happening with more regularity.
“You’re right in saying that it’s maybe more often now … that things start in Cannes,” he said. “To go back to your previous question, the studios have to understand that starting in Cannes is a good point … And that you can have your world premiere in Cannes in May and be still alive almost one year later in March in Hollywood.”
This year’s Official Selection has come together against the backdrop of the Iran War, with its unveiling in Paris taking place just 24 hours after the declaration of a fragile ceasefire between Iran’s Islamic Republic government and the U.S.
Cannes president Iris Knobloch alluded to the “uncertain times” in the backdrop in the announcement conference.
The selection, however, features few films dealing directly with contemporary conflicts but rather a raft of works set in the with the two world wars, including Lukas Dhont’s WWII drama Coward, Lázsló Nemes’ Moulin, Daniel Auteuil’s Une Nuit, and the first part of Pathé’s big-budget Charles de Gaulle biopic De Gaulle: Tilting Iron.
#CannesFilmFestival head Thierry Frémaux discusses why this year’s Official Selection features more films dealing with the two World Wars instead of contemporary conflicts.
“The way cinema today is connected with our world goes through period film because sometimes a period… pic.twitter.com/nEQcQUFfDY
— Deadline (@DEADLINE) April 9, 2026
“The way cinema today is connected with our world goes through period film because sometimes a period film is more a question about today than a description about the past,” said Frémaux. “For example, that great figure of French Resistance, Jean Moulin. The question of the film, is what could I have done at the time. Going to battles of the past is questioning those battles of today.”
“Iris was right. The world is very uncertain and the artists are never far away from the world. Even when they talk about love, they are talking about our world and it’s also why cinema is still so popular,” he continued. “It’s there and all together, watching the film on the big screen, where we understand who we are and who are the others. And that is still the mission of the cinema.”
