Your Exclusive Guide to the 2025 Cannes Film Festival

The 2025 Cannes Film Festival kicks off next week, and everyone packing their bags for the Croisette is already stressing about their schedule. I’m David Canfield, and it’s no secret that this year’s Cannes is looking like a special one. I’ll be on the ground trying to capture every highlight alongside my colleague Richard Lawson, but this may be a fool’s errand—the star vehicles for the likes of Denzel Washington, Emma Stone, Jennifer Lawrence, Josh O’Connor, and Wagner Moura alone could fill out a screening slate. Yet Cannes is best known for international gems that premiere to little fanfare before going on to rousing, Oscar-winning success. Just ask Parasite, Anatomy of a Fall, or last year’s controversial (but still Oscar-winning!) Emilia Pérez.

Richard and I devised a cheat sheet on the movies we expect to generate the most buzz on the ground this year—because we’ve prescreened them (shh!), have heard great things from colleagues, or just cannot deny their pedigree. (Lynne Ramsay plus J.Law? Yeah, it’s on the list.) We will surely have missed some—I certainly didn’t see one of my favorite movies of last year, the romantic Indian drama All We Imagine as Light, coming—but take this guide as a promise that there will be something for everyone this year, and that awards season will unofficially kick into early, enticing gear when these films unveil themselves.

We’ve already published a few exclusives on some of the most anticipated titles set to launch at Cannes. I spoke with Paul Mescal and his The History of Sound director, Oliver Hermanus, about making a sweeping period drama anchored by a tender romantic encounter between Mescal and Josh O’Connor, and I profiled Mia Threapleton, who will be one of the big discoveries of this year’s festival for her lead turn in Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme—both because of her undeniable performance and the fact that a whole lot more people are about to find out that she’s Kate Winslet’s daughter. We’ll have more exclusives coming up next week, so stay tuned.

My advice to those both on the ground and following along at home: Keep your eyes on titles beyond the obvious hits. I’m hearing great things about the German drama Sound of Falling in competition, and have highlighted a few first features, in the Directors’ Fortnight entry Lucky Lu and the hushed Brazilian stunner Manas, for our curtain raiser. That’s to say nothing of the slew of celeb-driven directorial debuts in the lineup—from Kristen Stewart, Scarlett Johansson, and Harris Dickinson, respectively—or the uncompromising documentary Slauson Rec from first-time director Leo Lewis O’Neil, which depicts an unraveling Shia LaBeouf in real time.

I could keep going, but at this point, it’s time to let the films speak for themselves. See you in Cannes!

The Films That Will Rock CannesYour handy guide to the 2025 festival’s buzziest premieres.R E A D M O R E »Inside The History of Sound“It’s not just about sex and the intensity of falling in love,” Paul Mescal says. “It’s deeper than that.”R E A D M O R E »A First Look at TaskDo we have another Emmy-winning juggernaut on our hands from the creator of Mare of Easttown?R E A D M O R E »Meet Mia ThreapletonShe stars opposite Oscar winners Benicio Del Toro and Tom Hanks, among many A-listers, in the new Wes Anderson film—and holds her own.R E A D M O R E »