Critics Week goes international

Cannes Critics’ Week has unveiled an 11-film 2026 lineup with no American directors, a selection that opens on May 13 with Phuong Mai Nguyen’s animated feature “In Waves.” (thewrap.com) The 65th edition of the Cannes sidebar will run May 13 to May 21 with seven competition titles and four special screenings. Organizers said they chose the features from 1,050 submissions from 106 countries. (screendaily.com) Critics’ Week is the Cannes section reserved for first and second features, and nine of this year’s 11 selected films are first features eligible for the Camera d’Or prize for a debut feature across the festival. Artistic director Ava Cahen has led the section since 2022. (semainedelacritique.com) (screendaily.com) Nguyen’s “In Waves” is the first animated film ever picked to open Critics’ Week. The California-set adaptation of AJ Dungo’s graphic memoir follows a skateboarder and a surfer whose relationship is tested by illness, with Will Sharpe and Stephanie Hsu leading the English-language voice cast. (variety.com) (hollywoodreporter.com) The absence of United States directors extends a pattern visible in Cannes’ main selection announcement last week, where American titles were also scarce. Critics’ Week instead spread its slots across Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America, with almost 20 countries represented. (thewrap.com) (variety.com) The competition lineup includes films by Zou Jing of China, Sara Ishaq of Yemen and Scotland, Blerta Basholli of Kosovo, Bruno Santamaria Razo of Mexico, Marine Atlan of France, Alexander Murphy of France and Ireland, and Aina Clotet of Spain. Screen Daily reported that filmmakers from Kosovo and Yemen are represented in competition for the first time this year. (thewrap.com) (screendaily.com) Several of the selected films are rooted in recent or unresolved history. Basholli’s “Dua” centers on a 13-year-old girl living with the effects of the Kosovo-Serbia conflict, while Ishaq’s “The Station” is set around a women-only gas station in war-affected Yemen. (screendaily.com) (hollywoodreporter.com) Other competition titles look backward at social crises through family stories. Santamaria Razo’s “Six Months in the Pink Building” is set in 1996 and follows a boy whose father is diagnosed with Human Immunodeficiency Virus, while Zou’s “A Girl Unknown” follows a young woman raised by three families against the legacy of China’s one-child policy. (variety.com) (hollywoodreporter.com) The section will close with Félix de Givry’s debut “Adieu monde cruel,” about a 14-year-old boy who disappears after a failed suicide attempt. The special screenings are Julien Gaspar-Oliveri’s “Stonewall” and Pierre Le Gall’s “Flesh and Fuel,” alongside the opening and closing films. (screendaily.com) (thewrap.com) Critics’ Week is Cannes’ oldest independent sidebar, and its past selections introduced directors including Guillermo del Toro, Julia Ducournau, Bernardo Bertolucci, Jacques Audiard, Ken Loach and Alejandro G. Iñárritu to the festival. This year’s edition starts one day after the 2026 Cannes Film Festival opens, with the section again staking its identity on first-time and second-time filmmakers rather than established names. (thewrap.com)