Neon, Mubi, A24: The Buyers That Won Cannes 2025
Cannes Film Festival 2025
The Cannes Film Festival is officially over and last night's list of winners is already giving us an overview of the next awards season. While some movies are still looking for a home, the biggest titles of this year's edition such as Die My Love, Sentimental Value, Palme d'Or's winner It Was Just An Accident, Sirat or The Mastermind, quickly became the most coveted titles on the Croisette and inside the Marché du Film.
Over the years, Neon has become an incredibly powerful buyer and the possibility that they might get their 6th Palme d'Or in a row became a reality last night, when It Was Just An Accident, directed by Jafar Panahi, was announced by the President of the Jury, Juliette Binoche.
After Anora, Anatomy of a Fall, Triangle of Sadness, Titane and Parasite -movies that all led a major awards season- Panahi's film as well as Joachim Trier's Sentimental Value, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes last night, are already some of the strongest contenders that Neon just added to an already impressive track record.
On top of these two films, Neon also acquired the rights to Oliver Laxe's Sirat, winner of the Jury Prize last night, Kleber Mendonça Filho's The Secret Agent, who won the Best Director award, Julia Ducournau's Alpha, Michael Angelo Covino's Splitsville and Raoul Peck's Orwell: 2+2=5.
However, the first big sale that everyone was talking about on the Croisette last week came from Mubi, which acquired the rights to Lynn Ramsay's Die My Love, starring Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson for $24 million. These past few years, Mubi led a strong awards season by acquiring some big titles during the Cannes Film Festival, like Coralie Fargeat's The Substance last year, and Magnus Von Horn's The Girl with the Needle.
This year, the distributor also acquired the rights to the Palme d'Or winner for the distribution in Latin America, U.K., Ireland, Germany, Austria, Turkey and India. Mubi will also distribute Sirat in Italy, Turkey and India.
Another big buy from Mubi was last night's second winner of the Jury Prize -a tie with Sirat- The Sound of Falling directed by Mascha Schilinski. On top of that, Mubi also acquired The History of Sound, directed by Oliver Hermanus and starring Paul Mescal and Josh O'Connor, and Kelly Reichardt's The Mastermind, also starring O'Connor.
For now, A24 will distribute Ari Aster's Eddington, Spike Lee's Highest to Lowest, and Harry Lighton's debut feature Pillion, starring Alexander Skarsgard and Harry Melling, which won Best Screenplay in the Un Certain Regard competition.
This article will be updated as additional sales are announced.
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