171. Cannes 2025: Navigating the festival beyond the Competition

The 2025 Cannes Film Festival kicks off today...and the question on everyone's mind is: what will be the great movies?

Mostly, people look to the Cannes Competition (the films that compete for the Palme d'Or) to find the best films. But it's a lesser-known fact that many amazing films screen in the festival's sidebars.

And many of the best films in cinema history have screened in the festival's sidebars. In fact, Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, which was named the greatest film of all time in the 2022 Sight & Sound poll did not screen in competition! It screened in the Directors' Fortnight.

So on today's episode, Alex peels back the curtain on how all the different parts of the Cannes Film Festival work together. And she talks about the amazing films you've heard of (and some you probably haven't) that have screened outside the festival's competition. And she talks about some of the films she's excited for this year.

Finally, Alex talks about some of the films she's excited for in this year's competition, and how they were already making fantastic films years ago that were hiding out in the festival's sidebars.

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