Cannes Film Festival is more than just gorgeous gowns, auteur films, and indiscriminate standing ovations. It’s also one of the largest and most distinguished film markets in the world. The Marché du Film — the setting where sales companies hawk their latest slate of films — runs parallel to the Cannes, offering up the rights to films both appearing in the festival and outside of it. Take the star-studded May December, for example. The Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman–led festival smash emerged as one of the buzziest free agents in competition for the Palme d’Or, but will leave the Côte d’Azur with a different grand prize: an $11 million distribution deal with Netflix. Other exciting offerings, including a Paddington sequel, a Liev Schreiber and Josh Hutcherson–starring Ernest Hemingway adaptation, and a new Bambi slasher, found homes as well. Neon, for its part, acquired Wim Wenders’s Perfect Days — could this extend its Palme d’Or winning streak after its awards for Triangle of Sadness, Titane, and Parasite? Below, all the titles that picked up distribution at Cannes 2023.
Festival Titles
The Zone of Interest (director: Jonathan Glazer)
Distributor: A24
Based on the novel of the same name by Martin Amis, who died the day after the film premiered at Cannes to acclaim, this Holocaust drama focuses on the lives of a Nazi commander and his family who live next to Auschwitz.
Price: Undisclosed
Perfect Days (director: Wim Wenders)
Distributor: Neon
Wenders, a leading figure in the New German Cinema movement, places his latest effort in Japan, weaving a tender character-study story about an elderly Tokyo man’s humble, routinized life.
Price: Undisclosed
Fallen Leaves (director: Aki Kaurismäki)
Distributor: Mubi
The Finnish auteur’s 20th feature tells the story of a chance meeting between two lonely people one night in Helsinki. Can they overcome their red flags and find love in this tragicomedy?
Price: Undisclosed
The Settlers (director: Felipe Gálvez)
Distributor: Mubi
Gálvez’s Chilean western follows a group of three men hired by a wealthy Spanish landowner to survey his sprawling property. The men, one American, one Scottish, and one Indigenous, are expected to eliminate the property’s local tribes.
Price: Undisclosed
Anselm (director: Wim Wenders)
Distributor: DCM in Germany
Wenders’s second feature at Cannes this year is a documentary about the life and work of contemporary artist Anselm Kiefer.
Price: Undisclosed
May December (director: Todd Haynes)
Distributor: Netflix
A Hollywood actress shadows a married couple whose tabloid romance and large age gap gripped the nation 20 years ago. Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore, and Charles Melton star.
Price: $11 million for North America
Strange Way of Life (director: Pedro Almodóvar)
Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics, Mubi
Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal carry a Pedro Almodóvar–directed gay western.
Price: Undisclosed
Firebrand (director: Karim Aïnouz)
Distributor: International deals with Sony Pictures, STX International
Alicia Vikander and Jude Law star in a revisionist period drama about Henry VIII and his sixth and final wife, Katherine Parr.
Price: Undisclosed
In Our Day (director: Hong Sang-soo)
Distributor: Cinema Guild
The South Korean auteur directs a minimal project about two people — a woman in her 40s and a man in his 70s — who share ramyun with their respective visitors and talk about life.
Price: Undisclosed
Anatomy of a Fall (director: Justine Triet)
Distributor: Neon
A German writer and her French husband grapple with the death of their 11-year-old son — with the former eventually becoming the main suspect.
Price: Undisclosed
The Delinquents (director: Rodrigo Moreno)
Distributor: Mubi
A bank employee and his co-worker hatch a plan to rob their employer.
Price: Undisclosed
Robot Dreams (director: Pablo Berger)
Distributor: Neon
The first-time director helms this animated film about a man who decides to build, then abandon, his robot friend, leaving open the possibility of their reconciliation.
Price: Undisclosed
Black Flies (director: Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire)
Distributor: International deals with Signature Entertainment and FilmNation Entertainment
A Sean Penn and Tye Sheridan–starring drama about a paramedic’s adrenaline-pumping nights and his days spent studying for medical school.
Price: Undisclosed
Cobweb (director: Kim Jee-woon)
Distributor: International deals with MovieCloud, Edko Films, and more
Song Kang-ho stars in this period drama about a filmmaker attempting to finish what he believes to be his masterpiece.
Price: Undisclosed
Marché du Film Titles
Hot Mess (director: Katie Locke O’Brien)
Distributor: Vertical
O’Brien’s directorial debut stars Emma Roberts, whose character undergoes a meltdown on a reality dating competition and must face her hometown’s judgment upon return. The film is set to begin production early next year.
Price: Undisclosed
Paddington in Peru (director: Dougal Wilson)
Distributor: Sony
The third Paddington entry begins filming in July.
Price: Undisclosed — Paddington 2 went for $30 million plus auction
The End We Start From (director: Mahalia Belo)
Distributor: Republic Pictures
An apocalyptic thriller starring Jodie Comer. The film follows a woman (Comer) and her newborn child as they try to escape London flood waters and find their way home.
Price: In the mid-seven figures
Across the River and Into the Trees (director: Paula Ortiz)
Distributor: Bleecker Street
Josh Hutcherson and Liev Schreiber lead the film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s last novel. Set in post-WWII Italy, an army colonel coming to terms with his PTSD enlists a military driver to take him to Venice.
Price: Undisclosed
Old Guy (director: Simon West)
Distributor: International deals with Vertigo Releasing, Lumiere Ventures, SND Films, and more
An aging hit man takes one last job — and must train a sassy prodigy assassin. Christoph Waltz, Lucy Liu, and Cooper Hoffman star.
Price: Undisclosed
In Water (director: Hong Sang-soo)
Distributor: The Cinema Guild
The director’s other film to sell at Cannes follows a young actor who gave up acting to make a short film on Jeju Island and the people he encounters there.
Price: Undisclosed
The Crime Is Mine (director: François Ozon)
Distributor: Music Box Films
Billed by some as a post–Me Too comedy, the 1930s French period piece about a struggling actress who stands trial for murdering an asshole producer stars Isabelle Huppert, Rebecca Marder, and Nadia Tereszkiewicz.
Price: Undisclosed
They Shot the Piano Player (directors: Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal)
Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics
An animated documentary about a New York journalist who researches the disappearance of genius Brazilian pianist Tenório Jr.
Price: Undisclosed
High and Low — John Galliano (director: Kevin Macdonald)
Distributor: Mubi
A documentary about acclaimed fashion designer John Galliano, whose career ended after a video of him using antisemitic and racist slurs circulated.
Price: Undisclosed
Den of Thieves 2: Pantera (director: Christian Gudegast)
Distributor: Briarcliff Entertainment
Gerard Butler stars in the sequel to the heist thriller that made over $80 million worldwide.
Price: Undisclosed
Mercy Road (director: John Curran)
Distributor: Well Go USA Entertainment
The director of Chappaquiddick is back with a psychological thriller led by Luke Bracey.
Price: Undisclosed
Camp Hideout (director: Sean Olson)
Distributor: Roadside Attractions
A troubled teen on the run hides at a summer camp. Corbin Bleu, Christopher Lloyd, and Ethan Drew star.
Price: Undisclosed
The Origin (director: Andrew Cumming)
Distributor: Bleecker Street
This five-time British Independent Film Award nominee is a Stone Age–era horror flick about a band of early humans.
Price: Undisclosed
Untitled Ernest Cole Documentary (director: Raoul Peck)
Distributor: Magnolia
The director of I Am Not Your Negro unravels the life of Ernest Cole, South Africa’s first Black freelance photographer.
Price: Undisclosed
Lola (director: Andrew Legge)
Distributor: Dark Sky Films
In 1941, two women build a time machine that can parse broadcasts from the future. Legge and his cinematographer, Oona Menges, use period cameras and lenses to shoot the film and otherwise employ found footage.
Price: Undisclosed
Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey Sequel (director: Rhys Frake-Waterfield)
Distributor: International deals with Cinemex, Crone Film, Pictureworks, and more
The sequel to the Winnie the Pooh slasher that debuted earlier this year.
Price: Undisclosed
Bambi (director: Scott Jeffrey)
Distributor: ITN
A horror film that uses the character of Bambi much like this year’s Winnie the Pooh slasher. Think Cujo.
Price: Undisclosed
Golden Years (director: Barbara Kulcsar)
Distributor: Music Box Films
A hit in Sweden about an elderly couple whose marital problems emerge on a cruise.
Price: Undisclosed
This is a developing story.