🎥 Cannes 2026 Kicks Off: Market Records, Major Deals, and Meta's Debut
This is your French update, live from Substack.
Wednesday May 13th 2026
TOGETHER WITH :
LE BIG STORY 📥
SPECIAL FOCUS 🔎
FROM THE FRENCH MARKET 🤝
SPONSORED BY LE MARCHÉ DU FILM
Discover the new, reinvented platform for film & audiovisual professionals!
Join over 80,000 industry leaders already on Cinando — the essential networking and database platform created by the Marché du Film with support from Creative Europe MEDIA.
Rebuilt from the ground up, Cinando now offers smarter tools, upgraded services, and enhanced features to help you connect more efficiently with industry professionals worldwide.
What’s new?
· Redesigned interface, optimized for mobile and tablet devices
· Expanded scope to include TV content and immersive industries
· Curated discovery showcasing companies, people, films & content
· Upgraded flagship services for faster, smoother performance
Start exploring contacts, companies, projects, screeners, and more — today!
LE PETIT UPDATE 🗞️
Meta has officially ousted TikTok as Cannes’ strategic partner, bringing AI translation tools, Ray-Ban smart glasses, and a curated fleet of digital creators to cover the Croisette.
Early Market Deals are already closing fast: Neon secured North American rights for Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s All of a Sudden (which sold across Europe), while Mubi acquired worldwide rights to Lukas Dhont’s Coward.
In his pre-festival press conference, Cannes chief Thierry Frémaux brushed off political questions and defended the Official Selection against gender parity criticisms, noting that while the main competition sits at 22% female directors, the overall selection reaches 34%.
At their Cannes general assembly, the SCARE syndicate vigorously defended the French arthouse model and the CNC. Having grown to 365 member cinemas, they pushed back against multiplex circuits (like Megarama) blocking print access and announced a new open-data portal for the sector.
Meanwhile, the AFCAE (French Association of Arthouse Cinemas) used its own assembly to sound the alarm on shrinking territorial funding and rising political tensions, despite claiming a growing 38.5% theatrical market share.
Sacem is bringing film composers into the spotlight with a dedicated Cannes program, featuring networking events to connect musicians with directors, and a masterclass by César-winning composer Amine Bouhafa.