A Historic Moment for African Cinema at the 79th Cannes Film Festival
The curtain has fallen on the 79th Cannes Film Festival, and the Croisette delivered a closing ceremony packed with surprises, shared honors, and a genuinely historic moment for African cinema. Romanian director Cristian Mungiu won the ultimate prize—the Palme d'Or for Fjord—while Africa captured the festival's heart in ways that will have a lasting impact on the industry.
The Palme marks Mungiu's second win, his first coming in 2007 for 4 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days. The film also extends an extraordinary streak for indie distributor Neon, whose run of Palme d'Or winners began with Parasite in 2019—making Fjord its seventh consecutive champion.
Russian director Andreï Zviaguintsev's Minotaur scooped the Grand Prix, while German director Valeska Grisebach's Bulgaria-set slow-burn thriller The Dreamed Adventure won the Jury Prize. The Best Director award was a tie: Spanish duo Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi won for The Black Ball, sharing the prize with Polish filmmaker Paweł Pawlikowski for Fatherland—Pawlikowski's second directorial prize at Cannes, having previously won in 2018 for Cold War.
Acting honors were distributed broadly. Best actress was shared between French actress Virginie Efira and Japan's Tao Okamoto, leads in Ryusuke Hamaguchi's emotional drama. Suddenly, both performers were visibly moved as they took the stage. The best actor prize went to newcomers Emmanuel Macchia and Valentin Campagne, leads in Lukas Dhont's WWI drama Coward, a portrait of queer love in the trenches. Emmanuel Marre won best screenplay for A Man of His Time, a period drama.
The ceremony commenced with a heartfelt tribute: EGOT legend Barbra Streisand was awarded an honorary Palme d'Or. Unable to attend due to a knee injury, she was celebrated by legendary French actress Isabelle Huppert, who honored not only Streisand's achievements in film, music, and on the stage but also her decades of support for the LGBTQ+ community and religious and ethnic minorities.
Africa's Moment
But the story that will endure longest from Cannes 2026 is Africa's—and it begins with the Caméra d'Or. The prize for best first feature went to Ben'Imana, directed by Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo— the first film directed by a Rwandan filmmaker ever selected for Cannes' official selection. Co-produced between Rwanda, Gabon, and Ivory Coast, the film tackles community-led trials for justice and reconciliation in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide. Dusabejambo used a cast composed almost entirely of non-professional actors, with a crew she describes as "90% Rwandan and 100% African."
Equally electric was the Un Certain Regard section, where Congolese director Rafiki Fariala's Congo Boy earned a major prize of its own. Lead actor Bradley Fiomona Dembeasset won Best Actor in the section for his breakout performance, finishing his impassioned acceptance speech—delivered in song—with a declaration that stopped the room: "I am a young Congolese! I am a refugee! I am a star!" The film follows Robert, a 17-year-old Congolese refugee in Bangui trying to care for his younger siblings while chasing his dream of becoming a musician.
Un Certain Regard also screened Moroccan director Leïla Marrakchi's Strawberries, while the Esiri brothers' Clarissa represented Nigerian cinema at the Directors' Fortnight. This year's jury included Ivorian actor Isaach de Bankolé and Irish-Ethiopian actress Ruth Negga, and the opening ceremony was hosted by Franco-Malian actor Eye Haïdara—a visual statement that the festival's identity is shifting alongside its programming.
Both Dusabejambo and Fariala made history by flying the flags of their respective nations—Rwanda and the Central African Republic—over the Croisette for the very first time. That achievement alone would define a festival. That both filmmakers left with prizes signals something deeper: a Cannes finally expanding its lens to meet the full breadth of world cinema.
The 79th festival was, in the end, a reminder of what the form can do—hold beauty and brutality, history and hope, in the same frame. Africa showed up to Cannes 2026 not as a novelty but as a force.