Why Hollywood Is Skipping Cannes—and What It Says About the Industry
As Hollywood tightens control over its narratives and marketing, the risks of premiering films at Cannes may now outweigh the rewards—reshaping the role of festivals in the global industry.
The paradigm of film distribution has changed. That much is hardly news. Theatrical releases are no longer the center of gravity; streaming platforms have gained both weight and production capacity, and film festivals now occupy a different role than they once did. In that context, the announcement that the Cannes Film Festival will not feature movies from Hollywood studios lands as both a shock—and, at the same time, not really. What explains the absence of tentpoles and major industry names with films nearly ready for release?
A brief preface. In recent years, studios have brought some high-profile titles to Cannes, but these were typically splashy pre-premieres tied to imminent releases: installments from franchises like Star Wars, Top Gun, Indiana Jones, Mad Max, and Mission: Impossible—complete with A-list talent and the expected red-carpet circus. This year, those films are conspicuously absent. Steven Spielberg isn’t bringing Disclosure Day, Christopher Nolan isn’t premiering The Odyssey, the Tom Cruise–Alejandro González Iñárritu pairing won’t arrive with Digger, and there isn’t even room for The Mandalorian & Grogu. So what’s going on?
At first glance, it feels counterintuitive. In recent years, films that premiered at Cannes have gone on to occupy prominent positions in the broader cinematic conversation, well beyond the festival circuit. Titles like Sentimental Value, The Secret Agent, and It Was Just an Accident have earned Oscar nominations, won awards, and even flirted with Best Picture. That kind of visibility might suggest that Cannes plays an increasingly central role in the “prestige economy.” So why the pullback?
There’s a traditional explanation tied to timing: Cannes takes place in May, which is a long way from Oscar season. Studios often prefer to hold their releases until the final third of the year, when they can make a more direct impact on awards campaigns. That’s why it’s more common to see studio titles at the Venice Film Festival, which is also more welcoming to platform-backed productions.
Look more closely at the films that have truly benefited from Cannes exposure, and a pattern emerges: most are international—European, Asian, Latin American. For these lower-budget films, which lack the marketing muscle to break through globally, a red-carpet premiere and, ideally, strong critical reception can be transformative. Just ask Kleber Mendonça Filho, who could hardly have imagined that presenting The Secret Agent at Cannes 2025 would lead to a year-long global tour and a dramatic shift in his career, effectively turning him into a major figure on the world cinema stage.
That dynamic doesn’t necessarily apply to Hollywood productions. Films like Die, My Love! and Eddington fared poorly; The Phoenician Scheme passed by with limited impact; only the much smaller The Mastermind emerged relatively unscathed. Put differently: Cannes is an ideal platform for mid-sized films and European auteur co-productions, but for large-scale studio projects, the risks often outweigh the potential rewards. They have more to lose than to gain.
There’s also, I suspect, a more structural reason behind this absence. The transformation of the media ecosystem has allowed Hollywood to tightly control the narrative around its films domestically—through friendly influencers, targeted advertising, aligned press, and efficient “damage control.” Once those films travel to film festivals in Europe, they enter a far less manageable environment: traditional critics—French critics in particular—who tend to be harsher on big productions and less susceptible to studio or platform pressure.
Films like Eddington and Die, My Love! came out of Cannes significantly damaged and never recovered. Major franchises are less vulnerable—they’re often critic-proof—but they don’t necessarily need Cannes either, especially when staging a presence on the Croisette requires a substantial financial outlay, even for studios of that scale. From their perspective, it’s increasingly more efficient to stick to the standard playbook: U.S.-based press junkets, carefully selected international stops, viral-ready clips built around trivia or spectacle—and minimal exposure to the uncontrollable “media jungle” that Cannes represents.
After what happened at the Berlin International Film Festival—where journalists pressed stars to take positions on various international conflicts, particularly the situation in Gaza—studios may also feel there’s little upside in subjecting their talent to that kind of scrutiny. Speak up and risk backlash; stay silent and face criticism anyway. It’s a no-win scenario. Why invite another potential controversy?
Hollywood, in short, has retreated into its familiar operating model: paid influencers, a largely compliant press (often negotiating access or advertising in exchange for favorable coverage), and a social media ecosystem that can be managed through advertising and algorithms. Film festivals—Cannes most of all, though Berlin isn’t far behind, and only Venice remains relatively accommodating—represent, in that sense, a nuisance: a potential scandal, a high-risk proposition.
Spielberg doesn’t need it. Nolan doesn’t either. The festivals of the future will likely skew increasingly European, secondarily Asian, and—at a considerable distance—Latin American or African. In the long run, amid all this uncertainty, that may not be such a bad outlook for the years ahead.
