[Editor’s note: This story was originally published on April 10, 2025 when the first lineup announcement for this year’s Cannes Film Festival was released. It has been updated today to include two new additions to the competition section, including Lynne Ramsay’s “Die My Love.”]
Updated, April 23, 2025: As promised when the Cannes lineup was first released on April 10, 2025, the festival has now added two more films to its official competition slate, including Lynne Ramsay’s “Die My Love.” With that addition, this year’s competition lineup now includes seven films directed by women, tying 2023’s then-record-breaking slate of female directed-films. Our original story follows, with an update below in the “2025” section of our official breakdown.
It’s a tradition I long ago grew weary of: waking up early on an April morning to see how few women filmmakers had made it into Cannes’ competition section. For a long time, the festival seemed destined (or worse, depending on how you see it) to stall out with just four films directed or co-directed by women in the section. Hell, Cannes didn’t even program four competition titles from women until 2011 (the year after that milestone, in 2012, no women made it into the section). And, yes, it happened with last year’s edition, which included four female directors again.
There have been bright spots along the way, like 2023’s record-breaking competition lineup, which included seven films directed by women in a field of 21, plus an eventual Palme d’Or win for Justine Triet (only the third woman to win the festival’s top prize).
Today? Another bright spot, with six (!!) female directors announced so far, plus an out-of-competition festival opener directed by a woman (Amélie Bonnin’s “Leave One Day”), with festival director Thierry Frémaux promising that more films will be announced in the coming days.
Those other female-directed films include new features from Cannes regulars Kelly Reichardt (“The Mastermind”) and Julia Ducournau (“Alpha”), plus Mascha Schilinski (the buzzy “Sound of Falling,” previously titled “The Doctor Says I’ll Be Alright, But I’m Feelin’ Blue”), Hafsia Herzi (“La Petite Dernière”), Chie Hayakawa (“Renoir”), and Carla Simón (“Romeria”).
In recent years, films directed by women have proven to be some of the best and buzziest of the festival, like Triet’s Palme d’Or-winning (and Oscar-winning) “Anatomy of a Fall,” Coralie Fargeat’s juicy (and, yes, Oscar-winning) “The Substance,” Ducournau’s delirious Palme d’Or-winning “Titane,” and more.
As so often needs to be repeated in stories like this one, no one is asking for special treatment or easy breaks, but the festival’s resistance to recognizing that some of cinema’s most thrilling (and good) movies come from female filmmakers has long been lacking. Films like Triet, Fargeat, and Ducournau’s most recent Cannes entries could only have been made by them. So, yes, they could have only been made by women.
Is that changing? Is the success of Triet, Fargeat, Ducournau, and others too hard to deny? We sure think so, and today’s batch of new films proves that. Is there another female Palme d’Or winner in the bunch? We’ll find out in May.
It’s certainly taken long enough already. Consider some more history: Between 2016-2018, only three female filmmakers made it into competition each year; in 2019, the festival again notched four female directors in competition. (The festival was canceled in 2020. Though festival brass did announce which films would have been programmed, had the COVID pandemic not upended the world, they did not use the usual designations for those films, and there was no “competition section.”) Enough.
As previously reported, this year’s main competition jury president will be Juliette Binoche, who will oversee the choosing of the Palme d’Or and other festival awards alongside a jury yet to be announced. In a rare passing of the torch, Binoche takes the position from another woman, last year’s president Greta Gerwig. (The only other time this happened: Sophia Loren, 1966 jury president, succeeded 1965’s Olivia de Havilland.) This year’s festival will run May 13-24, 2025.
Below, you can get a better idea of just how massive today’s announcement is, as we look back and compare five years of women-directed films in the competition section.
2025
Total films in competition section directed or co-directed by women: 7 (updated April 23)
Percentage of section: 33.3
Directors: Lynne Ramsay, Kelly Reichardt, Julia Ducournau, Mascha Schilinski, Hafsia Herzi, Chie Hayakawa, Carla Simón
Wins at festival: TBD
Notable wins beyond festival: TBD
2024
Total films in competition section directed or co-directed by women: 4
Percentage of section: 18.18
Directors: Payal Kapadia, Andrea Arnold, Coralie Fargeat, Agathe Riedinger
Wins at festival: Grand Prix (Kapadia, “All We Imagine as Light”), Best Screenplay (Fargeat, “The Substance”)
Other recognitions of note: Fargaet’s “The Substance” was nominated for 5 Oscars (including Best Director and Best Original Screenplay) and won 1
2023
Total films in competition section directed or co-directed by women: 7 (for first time ever, current high mark)
Percentage of section: 33.3
Directors: Justine Triet, Ramata-Toulaye Sy, Alice Rohrwacher, Jessica Hausner, Kaouther Ben Hania, Catherine Corsini, Catherine Breillat
Wins at festival: Palme d’Or (Triet, “Anatomy of a Fall”), third woman to win
Other recognitions of note: Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” was nominated for 5 Oscars (including Best Picture and Best Director) and won 1 (Best Original Screenplay)
2022
Total films in competition section directed or co-directed by women: 5 (for first time ever)
Percentage of section: 23.8
Directors: Claire Denis, Kelly Reichardt, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Charlotte Vandermeersch, Léonor Serraille
Wins at festival: Grand Prix (Denis, “Stars at Noon”), Jury Prize (Vandermeersch, “The Eight Mountains”)
Other recognitions of note: Reichardt’s “Showing Up” won the Robert Altman Award at the Indie Spirits
2021
Total films in competition section directed or co-directed by women: 4
Percentage of section: 16.6
Directors: Ildikó Enyedi, Mia Hansen-Løve, Catherine Corsini, Julia Ducournau
Wins at festival: Palme d’Or (Ducournau, “Titane”), second woman to win
Other recognitions of note: “Titane” filmmaker Ducournau was nominated for Best Director at the BAFTAs, the film was also nominated for five European Film Awards and won 1
