Cannes 2025 Recap Part Two: Neon & Mubi Share The Spoils; Asian Sellers Quiet

May 28, 2025

Part Two of Streamlined’s Cannes 2025 recap looks at the sales business announced (or not announced) in the market this year. I’m keeping the recap of activity by the African continent and Arab world at the Cannes market for another newsletter, to be published shortly, as there’s a lot to say and some news about funds and events that sometimes gets lost in the heat of the market (I’m trying to keep these free newsletters shorter moving forward, which is easier said than done).

**Cannes Joint Jury Prize winner ‘Sirat’, acquired for various territories by Neon & Mubi**

Neon, Mubi & A24 Divide Official Selection Spoils Between Them

Similar to last year’s Cannes, three companies – Neon, Mubi and A24 – acquired a big chunk of the Cannes official selection for US distribution, and in the case of Mubi, several other international territories also. Some deals were done in eye-catching fashion on the ground in Cannes, including Mubi’s $24m swoop on Lynne Ramsay’s Competition title Die My Love, starring Jennifer Lawrence, while others had already been acquired before the market started. A24 came into Cannes with three titles (see below) but didn’t take any big swings during the market itself. Focus Features came to market with Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme already in the bag.

Neon of course made history by acquiring Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just An Accident, marking its sixth Palme d’Or acquisition in a row following Parasite, Titane, Triangle Of Sadness, Anatomy Of A Fall and Anora.

Netflix came in late with its first acquisition – and oh the irony – took North America rights on Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague, a French-language film about the making of Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless, and of course a love letter to cinema. It will be interesting to see if Netflix arranges theatrical screenings ahead of an Oscars campaign. Goodfellas has sold the film to a raft of theatrical distributors in Europe, but so far only a few Asian deals have been reported so I sincerely hope we don’t all end up watching this film online.

Sony Pictures Classics also came in late with the acquisition of North America and multiple territories on Camera d’Or winner The President’s Cake, set in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq (which coincidentally had its VFX done in Taiwan, a popular post location for many arthouse films). Janus Films/Sideshow and Metrograph, who were both so active at last year’s Cannes, were slightly quieter this year although Janus just now acquired North America rights to Chinese filmmaker Bi Gan’s competition title Resurrection, which took the Special Award in Competition, and Metrograph came into the market with Christian Petzold’s Directors Fortnight title Miroirs No. 3.

**Bi Gan’s Special Award winner ‘Resurrection’**

Outside of US deals and Mubi’s acquisitions for its usual territories (UK-Ireland, India, Italy, Turkey etc), it’s difficult to assess at this point how much business was being done internationally on the Official Selection and parallel section titles, especially as buyers are sitting on their hands and really taking their time to close deals. There’s also the classic buyer-seller standoff in many territories, especially those where box office is struggling to recover, with sellers still trying recoup pandemic-era losses and buyers claiming their prices are way too high. For sure all the action seems to be gravitating towards a handful of hot competition titles. I may attempt to follow this up later in the year to see how many of the Cannes titles are ending up in cinemas or on streaming platforms in Asia.

Here's a round-up of US acquisitions by the big three:

NEON – WHILE IN CANNES BOUGHT:
It Was Just An Accident, dir: Jafar Panahi (Competition, Palme d’Or)
The Secret Agent, dir: Kleber Mendonça Filho (Competition, Best Director & Actor)
Sirât, dir: Oliver Laxe (Competition, Joint Jury Prize)

CAME INTO CANNES WITH:
Alpha, dir: Julia Ducournau (Competition)
Sentimental Value, dir: Joachim Trier (Competition, Grand Prix)
Orwell: 2+2 = 5 (Cannes Premiere)

PRODUCED & FINANCED:
Splitsville, dir: Michael Angelo Covino (Cannes Premiere)

MUBI – WHILE IN CANNES BOUGHT:
Die My Love, dir: Lynne Ramsay (Competition)
Sound Of Falling, dir: Mascha Schilinski (Competition, Joint Jury Prize)

Mubi also has various international territories on: Alpha, It Was Just An Accident, The Secret Agent, Sentimental Value & Sirat

CAME INTO CANNES WITH:
The History Of Sound, dir: Oliver Hermanus (Competition)
My Father’s Shadow, dir: Akinola Davies Jr (Un Certain Regard)

PRODUCED & FINANCED:
The Mastermind, dir: Kelly Reichardt (Competition)

A24 – CAME INTO CANNES WITH:
Eddington, dir: Ari Aster (Competition)
Highest To Lowest, dir: Spike Lee (Out of Competition)
Pillion, dir: Harry Lighton (Un Certain Regard)

Asian Marketing Activity High But Dealmaking Slow On Market Titles

Either Asian sales companies are not announcing deals like they used to; or journalists are not reporting them (and fair enough, the trades have mostly stopped paying for journalists to cover Asia at Cannes); or Asian sellers are just not doing much business on the Croisette. On the other hand, nearly every Asian country had a series of seminars and networking events to promote their movies, locations and film commissions during the Cannes market.

So we can surmise that either too many Asian films are being made and not selling – or they’re doing business elsewhere – as I suggested in the first part of this Cannes recap. This could all be part of the increasing regionalisation of the global film business, that due to theatrical contraction and streaming monopolisation, most sellers tend to do business either within their own region or sell worldwide rights outside the film’s country of origin to a global streamer. The links round-up below contains all the sales deals announced on titles from Asia, Africa and the Middle East, but it’s nowhere near the same volume as new production announcements.

That also raises questions about how useful markets are for Asian sellers – do they need to attend Cannes, European Film Market (EFM) in Berlin, American Film Market (AFM) in Los Angeles and the new upcoming film market at Toronto International Film Festival? For sales companies travelling from outside the region they’re located in – they probably need another angle beyond just sitting in a booth and trying to sell their films. Either these events help them access public funding and private equity (true in the case of European events, probably less so for AFM) or they have an educational role.

Events like Cannes do seem to serve a purpose in helping everyone understand market trends, which are changing rapidly in every region; new advances in AI and other technologies, which were covered in depth in the new Village Innovation Pavilion; and to learn about new funds, festivals, sound stages and incentives being launched around the world. I attended as many sessions as I could, moderated a few, and found every panel was well attended and prompted a lively Q&A session afterwards.

Obviously people badly need market information, but it does surprise me the extent to which people stay within their own regional groupings at panels and networking events. It does help to compare what’s happening in your own part of the world with other regions, and Cannes is the best opportunity to do that, so perhaps it’s time for us all to get out of our comfort zones (and yes that’s easier said than done - I attended a few networking events where I didn’t know a soul and it was quite disorienting).

If anyone has any thoughts about the future of film markets and where the business is heading, please share on this newsletter or social media. Streamlined needs to be more of a community effort, not just me airing my thoughts, we need YOU the reader to share!

**Village Innovation pavilion, Cannes March 2025**

IN THE TRADES:

Streamlined by Liz Shackleton

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Streamlined by Liz Shackleton

Cannes 2025 Recap Part Two: Neon & Mubi Share The Spoils; Asian Sellers Quiet

Neon, Mubi & A24 Divide Official Selection Spoils Between Them

Asian Marketing Activity High But Dealmaking Slow On Market Titles

IN THE TRADES:

CORPORATE:

SOLD:

STREAMING UPDATES:

OBITUARY:

Discussion about this post