This year, a different wind is blowing on the Croisette. The Hollywood flash showers have lessened, and calculated glamour is toned down — instead, there are more films with darker themes, challenging narratives, and stories that confront the audience rather than courting their favor. Just days into the start of the Cannes Film Festival 2026, an atmosphere is forming that surprises many regular attendees: the film industry is pursuing risk again.
In particular, French director Léa Mysius’s Histoires de la nuit is being hotly debated. Adapted from Laurent Mauvignier’s novel, this work is already considered one of the strongest French films in the competition section. Audiences talk more about the atmosphere than the plot. The film hangs over viewers like a fog — suffocating, hypnotic, and at times evoking almost claustrophobia. Monica Bellucci and Benoît Magimel lead this story so powerfully that it becomes the center of long conversations on the Croisette that last until late at night.
A completely different but no less present work is James Gray’s Paper Tiger. This American director suddenly joined the competition section and brought back to Cannes the type of film that many had longed for. It is a film about quiet, sorrowful loneliness, family, and lost dreams—neither a superhero spectacle nor a franchise machine. Some critics already call it a small provocation against the modern studio system. It means that sometimes a small film can resonate louder than an explosion on screen.
Especially notable is the festival’s international orientation. Names like Pedro Almodóvar, Asghar Farhadi, Ryusuke Hamaguchi, and László Nemes dominate conversations in cafés near the Croisette. Many observers sense the return of the classic auteur film—that is, films where directors leave a distinctive signature beyond simple content.
This edition feels more political and sorrowful than previous ones. War, identity crises, ecological anxiety, and illusions of technological control thread darkly through many films. One journalist already described Cannes as a “tense festival.” Indeed, global developments seem to bleed directly onto the screen. Even glamorous premieres suddenly carry a more serious tone.
And Cannes is also changing noticeably outside the cinema. Influencers, TikTok critics, and content creators are pushing their way onto the red carpet among actors and directors. To some, this is a fresh breeze and an opening of the festival for the younger generation. On the other hand, others frown and criticize it as constant digital staging. This debate has now become as fixed an element of Cannes as smoking and evening dresses.
So far, there is no clear candidate for the Palme d’Or. That is precisely what makes this event more interesting. Instead of an overwhelming work, several radical and personal works are filling the festival overall this time. The grand splendor of the past may be lacking, but Cannes 2026 seems to remind us once again of the element that made this festival famous: brave films for those ready to be surprised.
Written by C. Hatty