Jafar Panahi's 'It Was Just an Accident' wins Palme d'Or at Cannes Film Festival

Marking an bonzer reversal of fortune, including stints successful situation and location apprehension during years of clandestine enactment erstwhile helium was forbidden by authorities from directing, Iran’s Jafar Panahi triumphed astatine the Cannes Film Festival connected Saturday, winning the event’s apical award, the Palme d’Or, for “It Was Just an Accident.”

Appearing to bask successful the vindication, Panahi clasped his hands down his caput and leaned backmost seated successful sunglasses, savoring the infinitesimal portion those astir him stood successful an ovation.

“It Was Just an Accident,” a tense play of retribution astir a torturer’s abduction by his victims, volition beryllium released successful 2025 connected an as-yet-unannounced day by Neon, the distributor that tin present assertion an unprecedented six-Palme winning streak, aft 2019’s “Parasite,” 2021’s “Titane,” 2022’s “Triangle of Sadness,” 2023’s “Anatomy of a Fall” and 2024’s “Anora” each prevailed. (There was nary festival held successful 2020 owed to the COVID-19 pandemic.)

Through a translator, Panahi accepted his grant humbly and spoke to the cosmopolitan impulse to marque art. “We don’t cognize wherefore we bash it,” helium said. “It’s thing I ticker my tiny children do. They sing and creation earlier they tin speak. But it’s different language. It could beryllium a connection of unification.”

This year’s Cannes assemblage was chaired by the seasoned French prima Juliette Binoche, who deliberated with a radical sourced from respective countries and disciplines. Jury members included the American actors Halle Berry and Jeremy Strong, India’s Payal Kapadia (director of “All We Imagine arsenic Light”) and Korean filmmaker Hong Sang-soo.

Cannes’ runner-up award, the Grand Prix, went to “Sentimental Value,” a home play astir a household of artists directed by Norway’s Joachim Trier, who broke done successful 2021 with “The Worst Person successful the World,” which earned 2 Oscar nominations.

The festival’s Jury Prize — fundamentally 3rd spot — was shared by 2 movies: Oliver Laxe’s “Sirât” and Mascha Schilinski’s “Sound of Falling.” Ties are not antithetic successful this category; they’ve occurred arsenic precocious arsenic 2022 and arsenic acold backmost arsenic 1957, erstwhile Cannes honored some Ingmar Berman’s “The Seventh Seal” and Andrzej Wajda’s “Kanał.”

Taking some the directing prize and the grant for champion histrion was Kleber Mendonça Filho’s “The Secret Agent,” a Brazilian transgression thriller acceptable successful 1977 starring Wagner Maura (“Civil War”). In the hotly contested class of champion actress, wherever on-the-ground predictions varied betwixt Jennifer Lawrence (“Die, My Love), Elle Fanning (“Sentimental Value”) and Zoey Deutch (“Nouvelle Vague”), Nadia Melliti pulled disconnected an upset for her crook successful “The Little Sister,” astir a French Algerian teen surviving successful Paris and coming retired to her Muslim family.