After nearly two weeks of exciting premieres, star-studded press conferences and beachside parties that go into the early hours, the Cannes Film Festival is ready to roll up the red carpet after one last task: crowning this year’s Palme d’Or winner.
The nine-strong jury, headed by French actor Juliette Binoche, will pick one of 22 films to award the top prize on Saturday night, with titles from Wes Anderson, Ari Aster, Richard Linklater and Joachim Trier among the competitors.
Other awards include the Grand Prix, jury prize, best director, best actor and best screenplay.
These awards can make or break careers: Renate Reinsve, who stars in Trier’s entry ‘Sentimental Value’, said that winning best actress in 2021 for ‘The Worst Person in the World’ completely changed her life.
The jury’s decisions will be closely watched after ‘Anora’, which won the top prize in 2024, went on to take home five Oscars, including the Best Picture top Academy Award. ‘The Substance’, which was awarded best screenplay at Cannes the same year, also won an Oscar.
One indicator of who could win is the selection of films that have been bought by independent distributor Neon, which has successfully picked the Cannes winner the last five times.
So far this festival, the U.S. distributor has nabbed three films: ‘Sentimental Value’, which received a 15-minute-plus standing ovation, ‘It Was Just an Accident’from Iranian director Jafar Panahi, and ‘The Secret Agent’ from Brazil’s Kleber Mendonca Filho. Other strong contenders, based on the annual jury grid compiled by industry publication ScreenDaily, include Stalinist-era legal piece ‘Two Prosecutors’ and German director Mascha Schilinski’s intergenerational drama ‘Sound of Falling’.
French director Julia Ducournau, who premiered ‘Alpha’ at this year’s festival, and Belgium’s Dardenne brothers are the only competitors who have previously won the top prize.
Ducournau became only the second woman to win in 2021 for ‘Titane’, while Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne have the rare honour of having won twice with ‘Rosetta’and ‘L’Enfant’ in 1999 and 2005, respectively. The 78th iteration of the festival officially kicked off on May 13 with the French comedy ‘Leave One Day’.