Cannes Film Festival 2026: Synopses, first looks, trailers of films in competition

The curtain has risen on the official selection of the 79th Cannes Film Festival.If one film were to be added to the competition — James Gray's "Paper Tiger" with Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson — 21 films have already competed for the Palme d'Or.

Cannes Film Festival 2026: Overview, first images and trailers of films in competition

The curtain has been partially lifted on the official selection of the 79th Cannes Film Festival.If just one film is added to the race — James Gray's "Paper Tiger" with Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson — 21 feature films are already fighting for the Palme d'Or.

21 films, including five feature films by French filmmakers, three by Spanish directors, three by Japanese directors... 79. The Cannes Film Festival competition redraws the map of world auteur films.This is why we note the weak presence of Anglo-Saxons - only one American film, no English or Australian films, and the absence of Latin America and the African continent.But here, in detail, is what we already know about the films.

"Our Salvation" with Emmanuelle Mare, Swann Arlaud, Sandrine Blancke...

Synopsis: September 1940. Henri Marre arrives alone in Vichy.Unbeknownst to him, he wants to find a place in the new regime.In his bag, he has his political text, Our Liberation, which he wants to publish.Henri wants to help save France from the conflict, but he may first save himself from his own trouble...

"The Unknown" by Arthur Harari, with Lea Seydoux and Nils Schneider...

Summary: About 40 years old, David Zimmerman is a photographer but no one knows him.Although he almost never leaves home, his friends drag him to crazy parties.He finds a woman in the crowd, he can't see her, he follows her... A few hours later, David wakes up: in a strange body.

Released August 23, 2026

Léa Misius' ``Night Story'' starring Hafsia Herzi and Bastien Bouillon

description:

Nora, Thomas and their daughter Ida live on an isolated farm with their only neighbor Cristina, an Italian artist.While everyone prepares Nora for a wonderful birthday, three men stay around the house and invite themselves to the party, revealing well-kept secrets…

Released on September 16, 2026

"A Woman's Life" with Leah Drucker, Charlene Bourgeois-Tauquet, Melanie Theory

Synopsis: 55-year-old Gabriel devotes himself body and soul to his job.A surgeon and department head at a public hospital, she runs and grows, overwhelmed by responsibility.She has little time for a personal life, with a man she loves and a mother to take care of.When a novelist spends weeks in his department writing a book, the balance is lost.Is there room for the unexpected to happen?

“Garance” Jeanne Herry, her Adèle Exarchopoulos, Sarom Giraudeau...

The summary: Garance is an alcoholic woman.Eight years of travel between moves, jobs, meetings, parties and worries, joys and difficult punishments... But also a change of intimacy, friendship and sexuality, a chaos that resembles a "great recess" where love and destruction mix.

Films made by foreigners in France

"Moulin" by Laszlo Nemes with Gilles Lellouche, Lars Eidinger ...

Summary: Jean Moulin is dropped into occupied France to join the Resistance network, under the wing of General de Gaulle.Despite his efforts to remain in the shadows, Moulin was betrayed and later sent to the Gestapo in Lyon, led by the ruthless Klaus Barbie.Tormented relentlessly, he never gave up.A calm determination will help mobilize the forces of the Resistance and give birth to a new spirit of struggle and freedom in France...

Accessed October 28, 2026

Helmed by Riosque Frontage, technical by Avec Vir, Ephyra, Tao Okamoto

Synopsis: As the head of an EHPAD in the suburbs of Paris, Marie-Lou tries to introduce an innovative and very humane approach to care, despite opposition.A chance encounter with Mari, a Japanese director suffering from cancer, changes his course.A deep friendship begins between two women with similar views and love of language, which will change their outlook on life and the whole organization.

Released on August 12, 2026

"Parallel stories" by Asghar Farhadi, Virginie Efira, Isabel Hubbard...

Synopsis: Looking for inspiration for her new novel, Sylvie spies on her neighbors across the street.When she hires young Adam to help her with her daily life, she is unaware that he will turn her life and her work upside down, until the fiction she imagines becomes more than reality.

It was published on May 14, 2026

Films made by European film directors

“Minotaur” by Andrei Zvyagintsev, with Iris Lebedeva Anatoli Bely Dmitri Mazourov

Synopsis: Russia, 2022. Gleb, a successful businessman, lives in a provincial town with his wife Galina and their son.In an increasingly unstable world, he is faced with ever-increasing professional problems.The collapse of a carefully constructed life quickly turns violent.

Published October 14, 2026

“Auto-narrative” by Pedro Almodovar, with Barbara Linni, Leonardo Sbaraglia, and Aitana Sánchez Gijón

Plot synopsis: Raoul is a cultural filmmaker in a creative crisis.When tragedy strikes one of his closest friends, he is inspired to write his next film.Gradually, he imagines Elsa, a director writing, whose journey begins to reveal itself.The two filmmakers become two sides of the same character in a game of mirrors, the obscenity of suicide revealing as much as it destroys.But we tell stories.How far can we go?

Joined May 20, 2026

"Othandekayo" by Rodrigo Sorogoyen, Javier Bardem, Victoria Luengo, Marina Fois…

Summary: World-famous director Esteban Martínez returns to Spain to film his new film.He gave the main role to an unknown young actress, his daughter, whom he had not seen for thirteen years.The young girl accepts this wonderful opportunity, but she knows that during filming she will confront a man she can never consider a father.The weight of the past threatens to reopen the wound.

Released on the day of the film's Cannes release

"La Bola Negra" av Los Javis, with Guitarricadelafuente, Miguel Bernardeau, Penélope Cruz...

Synopsis: Spain 1932, 1937, 2017. Three men.Three agesDesire, pain and legacy are the same invisible thread.LA BOLA NEGRA travels through time to reveal what binds them together.

Christian Mungiu or Sebastian Stan from “Fjord” or Renté Raceway…

Plot: Gheorghiu, a deeply religious Romanian-Norwegian couple, settle in a village at the end of a fjord, where they quickly become friends with their neighbors, the Halbergs.The children of the two families become very close despite their different upbringings.When teachers discover bruises on the body of Elias, the eldest of the Georgiou children, the community wonders if it could be due to the parents' traditional upbringing of the Georgiou children.

Released August 19, 2026.

"Gentle Monster" by Marie Kreutzer, with Léa Seydoux and Catherine Deneuve...

Synopsis: Lucy and Philip are happy, they moved with their son to a country house near Munich.Their lives change forever when the police come to their house one morning to arrest Philip and confiscate his computers.Desperate, Lucy searches for the truth about her husband.Who is he really?Should he take it away from his son?

"Atdheu" gan Pawel Pawlikowski, avec Hanns Zischler, Sandra Hüller...

Synopsis: In 1949, Thomas Mann, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, returns to Germany for the first time after the end of the war, together with his daughter Erika, an actress, writer and rally driver.At the wheel of a black Buick, they begin an arduous journey back to the country they fled sixteen years ago when the Nazi Party took power.From Frankfurt, under American rule, to Weimar, controlled by the Soviets, father and daughter travel through a devastated Germany, torn in two by the Cold War.

"Dream Adventure" by Valeska Griesebach with Yana Radeva, Suleiman Letifov

Synopsis: Near the border between Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey, a woman embarks on an illegal journey to help a man she doesn't know, but has a special relationship with.He takes his place in an adventure that takes him to a dangerous area, where he confronts his desires and his past.

"Pengecut" Lukas Dhont-en escutik, Emmanuel Macchia, Valentin Campagnerekin

Classification: 1916. During World War I, soldiers try to keep morale behind the trenches.

A movie directed by an Asian filmmaker

«Huh p member hand book ok ok x» De Hirokazu Kore-eda, Avec Haruka Ayase, Kotaro 5th...

Synopsis: In the near future, Otone and her husband Kensuke, who have lost a child, receive a robot identical to their son.

Checked on December 16, 2026

"Hope" by Na Hong-jin, with Jung-Min Hwang, In-sung Zo, Jung Ho-Yeon, Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander, Taylor Russell

Synopsis: A police inspector tries to shed light on the mysterious creatures found in a port village in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).

Kozhi Fukadagiin "Quelques jours à Nagi" Takako Matsu, Shizuka Ishibashi Nartai...

Synopsis: Divorced architect Yuri visits his former sister-in-law Yoriko, a sculptor who lives in the village of Nagi.At first, this stay, intended as a simple interlude, takes an unexpected turn when Yuri agrees to pose for her.During the sessions, the silence is filled with memories and the long-buried deep connection between the two women resurfaces.Away from the hustle and bustle of Tokyo, Yuri allows herself to be overcome by the sweetness of everyday village life and the lives of its inhabitants.invites to stay.

The film is directed by an American filmmaker

“Sevdiyim Adam” by Ira Sachs, Rami Malek, Rebecca Hall

Synopsis: Jimmy George is an artist who experiences an extraordinary moment between illness and death, where all beauty and all love are possible.