The 2024 Cannes Film Festival has come and gone, leaving a glittering red carpet in its wake. But which films made a lasting impression? Here are the five movies that had everyone talking — for better or for worse.

ANORA

Sean Baker’s romance took home this year’s Palme d’or. The critical darling is about a Brooklyn sex worker who marries into money. But the marriage is threatened when her new in-laws begin working to annul the union. The movie will be available to stream on HBOMax this fall.

 

KINDS OF KINDNESS

Hot off their Academy Award-winning Poor Things run, Emma Stone and director Yorgos Lanthimos are already promoting a new collaboration. An anthology film with three distinct stories (but sharing a cast which includes Jesse Plemons, Hong Chau, Margaret Qualley, Willem Dafoe, Hunter Schafer, and Mamoudou Athie), Kinds of Kindness is darkly humorous, but also leans towards the grotesque. This has divided critics, but hasn’t slowed the enthusiasm of its creators. Before the festival ended, it was announced that Stone, Lanthimos, and Plemons—who won Best Actor at this year’s festival—will be working together on a new project soon.

 

MEGALOPOLIS

Francis Ford Coppola has spent decades (and $120 million his own fortune) on this passion project. The story is a sprawling science-fiction epic about an architect’s quest to rebuild the fictional metropolis of New Rome after it falls. The cast has stars like Adam Driver, Aubrey Plaza, Laurence Fishburne, and Dustin Hoffman, but is also stacked with character actors like Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Talia Shire, Balthazar Getty, and more. Reviews have been mixed, with some critics left disappointed by the effort—although that might not even matter. As of current writing, Coppola still hasn’t found a domestic distributor for the film. That said, it will still appear on a limited number of IMAX screens in late September. The scarcity alone might be reason to snag a ticket.

THE APPRENTICE

Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong are said to give outstanding performances as Donald Trump and Roy Cohn, respectively, in this biopic of the businessman. Critics found the film fun and energetic. But that doesn’t mean much to the real-life Trump. According to the New York Times, he’s threatening to sue for defamation over the film’s portrayal of him. Meanwhile, GQ reports that Dan Snyder, a wealthy friend of Trump’s, provided funding for the film thinking it would show him in a positive light.

HORIZON: AN AMERICAN SAGA

Kevin Costner’s passion project (he directed, starred in, and financed the film) fared better than Coppola’s: it was beloved by Cannes audiences, receiving an extensive standing ovation, to the point that Costner was moved to tears. Or at least, the first part was. Horizon—a Western set during the Civil War—is the first of three films. It hits theaters in June, with part two coming as early as August. The final chapter began filming this month. The sprawling ensemble cast also features Sam Worthington, Giovanni Ribisi, Danny Huston, Jena Malone, Jamie Campbell Bower, Luke Wilson, and Sienna Miller.