The Most Anticipated Films of Cannes Film Festival 2025

This morning, cinephiles eagerly awaited the unveiling of the 78th Cannes Film Festival lineup, and it certainly delivered. Running from May 13 to 24, the festival will open with a historic first: a debut feature, Leave One Day, by French filmmaker Amélie Bonin.

The announcement, led by festival director Thierry Frémaux, was packed with exciting reveals. Among the most talked about is the inclusion of The History of Sound in the main competition. Directed by Oliver Hermanus and starring Josh O’Connor and Paul Mescal, the period romance is one of the year’s most anticipated films.

O’Connor will also appear in The Mastermind, another competition title, opposite Alana Haim. Directed by Kelly Reichardt, the film centers on a high-stakes art heist set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War and the women’s liberation movement.

Also debuting in competition is Wes Anderson’s 12th feature, The Phoenician Scheme, a stylized espionage tale about a father (Benicio del Toro) and his nun daughter (Mia Threapleton). As expected, members of Anderson’s signature ensemble cast return – Bill Murray, Benedict Cumberbatch and Scarlett Johansson – alongside first timer Michael Cera.

Norwegian filmmaker Joachim Trier will premiere Sentimental Value, reuniting with Renate Reinsve, the breakout star of The Worst Person in the World. Also starring Elle Fanning, the film is described as a meditation on family and the redemptive power of art.

Previous Palme d’Or winner Julia Ducournau returns with Alpha, a poignant tale set in a gritty city. Starring Golshifteh Farahani and Tahar Rahim, the film follows a troubled teenager who lives alone with her mother.

Marking his return to the Croisette nearly a decade after Boyhood, Richard Linklater will present Nouvelle Vague, a behind-the-scenes dramatization of the making of Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless. The film stars Zoey Deutch as Jean Seberg and Guillaume Marbeck as Godard.

Ari Aster’s Eddington also joins the slate of films in competition, blending black comedy and western horror with an A-list cast including Austin Butler, Emma Stone, Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal.

From the lineup of French offerings, Hafsia Herzi’s adaptation of La Petite Dernière, Fatima Daas’ autobiographical novel, promises to be a standout. The film follows Fatima, the youngest daughter of Algerian immigrants, as she comes of age, explores her same-sex desires and grapples with the constraints of her Muslim upbringing. Alex Lutz will also premiere Connemara, an adaptation of Nicolas Mathieu’s novel of the same name. The story explores two people who reunite as adults after attending high school together, who are now both lost in their lives. 

Dissident Russian stage and film director Kirill Serebrennikov returns this year with The Disappearance of Josef Mengele, an adaptation of a historical non-fiction novel by Olivier Guez, about the fugitive years of notorious Nazi doctor Josef Mengele.  

A final exciting inclusion is the directorial debut of Harris Dickinson, the internet’s babygirl, with his film Urchin, about an unhoused person in London trying to break away from a cycle of self-destruction. Scarlett Johansson will also show her directorial debut with Eleanor the Great, a heartwarming story about a 90-year-old who attempts to make new friends following the death of her best friend.