The 2026 Cannes Film Festival is underway with French filmmaker Pierre Salvadori’s The Electric Kiss serving as the opening-night pic.
Among the headline filmmakers debuting new works on the Croisette this year are previous Palme d’Or winners Cristian Mungiu and Hirokazu Kore-eda, two-time Oscar-winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi and American indie veteran Ira Sachs.
The Electric Kiss is joined by new films from stalwart auteurs including Pedro Almodóvar, Cristian Mungiu, Guillaume Canet, Nicolas Winding Refn and Paweł Pawlikowski
Read all of Deadline’s takes below throughout the festival, which runs May 12-23. Click on the title to read the full review (some films will be reviewed only on this page) and keep checking back as we update the list.
Section: CompetitionDirector: Ryusuke HamaguchiCast: Virginie Efira, Tao Okamoto, Kyoza Nagatsuka, Jean-Charles Clichet, Maria Bunel, Romain CottardDeadline’s takeaway: All of a Sudden, a film that marks Hamaguchi’s first French-made film, has much to recommend about it, but the overall impact is diluted due to the length of some sequences which feel endless and almost more like an academic exercise than an actual movie. — PH
The opening of the film, shot in darkness and shadows, shows us a mother tearfully saying goodbye to her sleeping children. This is just the beginning of the long emotional journey for Lucila and Diego as they will find a way to reunite with their mother. Diaz as Lucila is a revelation and the heart and soul of Ashes, which is based on the book by Brenda Navarro. Paz is also effective as the mother who felt she was out of choices and made a fateful decision, one that has tragic consequences. Ashes becomes a rich, and undeniably timely, addition to film depictions of the experiences of immigrants in both heartbreaking and humane ways. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector-screenwriter: Lee MysiusCast: Benoit Magimel, Hafsis Herzi, Monica Bellucci, Tawba El Gharschi, Paul Hamy, Alan Delhaye, Sevane Ducorps, Talia TsuladzeDeadline’s takeaway: Unlike many of the other Competition entries this year, this home-invasion thriller doesn’t appear to have a whole lot on its mind other than just trying to entertain in a well-worn genre guaranteed to make you uncomfortable. But the intense drama has its moments. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector: Lukas DhontCast: Emmanuel Macchia, Valentin CampagneDeadline’s takeaway: Lukas Dhont is a filmmaker whose eye is on people and what makes us who we are. Set in 1914 during World War I, Coward is a war film in name only, more a celebration of a human need to sing, to dance — even in the most unimaginably horrific of circumstances. — PH
Section: Out of CompetitionDirector-screenwriter: Andy GarciaCast: Andy Garcia, Rosemarie DeWitt, Brendan Fraser, Dustin Hoffman, Danny Huston, Bill Murray, Vicky Krieps, Robert Patrick, Rachel Ticotin, Yul Vazquez, LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Demian BichirDeadline’s takeaway: Andy Garcia wrote, directed, stars in and with Arturo Sandoval composed the music for this wonderfully atmospheric, nostalgic and entertaining contemporary gumshoe noir that serves as a shimmering love letter to L.A. with 52 locations shot over 25 days on an indie budget. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector-screenwriter: Na Hong-JinCast: Hwang Jung-Min, Hoyeon, Zo In-Sung, Yung Bae, Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander, Taylor Russell, Cameron BrittonDeadline’s takeaway: Sci-fi alien monster mash never lets up for a minute of its two-hour, 40-minute running time and out-Hollywoods anything of its kind made by Hollywood. There can be no doubt Director Na is a master at this stuff, and the motion-capture work is comparable to Avatar, which keeps winning Oscars for doing this kind of thing. — PH
Section: Out of CompetitionDirector: Guillaume CanetCast: Marion Cotillard, Leonardo Sbaraglia, Aron Ramo, Denis Menochet, Luis Zahera, Marta Etura, David TalbotDeadline’s takeaway: Marion Cotillard has one of the most intense roles of her career in Guillaume Canet‘s pulsating French thriller. With themes of cults, adoption, a missing person and escaping a troubled past, the film successfully navigates the line between arthouse and genuine commercial prospects. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector: Ira SachsCast: Rami Malek, Tom Sturridge, Luther Ford, Maisy Stella, Rebecca Hall, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Dennis Courtis, Blanke Zizka, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Sasha LaneDeadline’s takeaway: Instead of focusing on the dark side of the AIDS crisis as so many films and plays have done, this one celebrates the continuing desire to keep moving, to be unapologetically alive and energized to give all you have left to art. It’s a humane and heartrending film about the love of art and the love of artists. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector-screenwriter: James GrayCast: Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, Miles Teller, Gavin Goudey, Roman Engel, Yavor Vesselinov, Victor PtakDeadline’s takeaway: This noirish little gem is right up there with the very best James Gray films. And it’s some of the finest work stars Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson and Miles Teller have done. This superbly crafted story keeps you engaged at every turn by Gray, who knows how to twist a crime-genre tale into something fresh and pulse-pounding. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector: Asghar FarhadiCast: Isabelle Huppert, Virginie Efira, Vincent Cassel, Pierre Niney, Adam Bessa, India Hair, Catherine DeneuveDeadline’s takeaway: What Farhadi has brilliantly cooked up ultimately feels wholly original and deliciously crafted on every level, and with the help of a perfectly chosen cast there isn’t a false step even in a tricky scenario like this one. This may be the filmmaker’s best-ever in terms of style and pure picturemaking skill, and for me certainly his finest since A Separation. — PH
Section: CompetitionDirector-screenwriter: Hirokazu Kore-edaCast: Haruka Ayase, Daigo, Kuwaki RimuDeadline’s takeaway: A light yet somehow profound study of grief that deals with death in an unusual but surprisingly cathartic way. By the end, it is clear that Kore-eda has taken the stuff of dystopian cyberpunk nightmares and turned it into an elegant, wistful fairytale, fashioning a beautiful allegory in which all the main characters are reborn. — DW
Source: deadline.com