Cannes – While the absence of major Hollywood studios has caused a stir in Cannes this year, Eugene Hernandez, director of the Sundance Film Festival, founded by the late Robert Redford, told RFI why this needn't be cause for concern.
RFI : What do you think has been the biggest change in the US film industry since Donald Trump’s re-election?
Eugene Hernandez: Over the last two years, the biggest change has been the expansion and deepening of independent cinema in the United States. We’re here at the Cannes Film Festival, talking about Hollywood and wondering whether Hollywood is in crisis. But it's on the independent side that I see hope, potential and energy. In the US, there is this divided structure. You have the studio system, which is very dominant and vast, and is going through a period of change, consolidation and evolution. But on the independent side, we are witnessing incredible growth in film production, coming from all over the country, but also from all over the world.
At the Sundance Film Festival, we receive 16,000 new films every year to screen and consider. We will select just 150 of them. That represents a huge amount of production and energy developing outside the Hollywood system. We have seen this movement continue, even with the pandemic, even with the changes in distribution and in the studio system. Independent film production in the US and around the world remains very strong.
RFI: Given there are no films from the major Hollywood studios in the official selection at the Cannes festival, do you see this as a sign of weakness in Hollywood or at Cannes?
EH: I don’t see any signs of weakness on the part of the Cannes Film Festival, as I’m already seeing some very rich, powerful and interesting films. The presence of films from the American studio system is something very cyclical, which varies from year to year. I know this is a major topic of discussion at the moment: why there aren’t more American studio films? But I look at the programme and I see a great deal of interest in films like The Man I Love, which is in the running for the Palme d’Or. Ira Sachs is an American director who has been making films outside the studio system for decades.
So, even if the major studios aren’t bringing films to Cannes this year, at least independent filmmakers are there to present their work. And I think the festival is as strong as ever in its ability to offer this panorama, this overview, this glimpse of cinema from all over the world. And it changes every year. Some years, the focus is on one country or region, other years it's on another. And this year, it’s different.
RFI: There have been reports from the US of censorship in libraries, book bans, exhibition bans, censorship in museums... What is the situation in the film industry?
EH: The situation for cinema is varied. The state of cinema in the US remains eclectic, diverse and robust. This is because films in the US do not need to follow a single path to reach their audience. Films can find an audience through multiple channels. Multiplexes, of course, those large cinema chains, but where I find a great deal of hope and enthusiasm is in arthouse cinemas and independent venues.
There is an organisation called Art House Convergence, an alliance of arthouse cinemas in the US. It is these cinemas that tend to organise film festivals and play a more active role within their communities. As a staunch advocate of independent cinemas, I firmly believe that every community needs a supermarket, a café, a police station, a library, a cinema… It is an essential part of the fabric of any community.
And when we look at the art-house community and the art-house cinema ecosystem in the US, we can see this growth in independent cinemas. These cinemas are independent and screen the films they wish to show to their audiences. And they are currently enjoying considerable success.
RFI: There might not be any major Hollywood productions at Cannes this year, but five of the 11 documentaries in the official selection come from the US. Does this mean there is a growing appetite for the genre there?
EH: The making, production and distribution of documentaries is currently a thriving industry in the US. Every year at the Sundance Film Festival, we present a programme of documentaries that attracts a great deal of attention. Last year the five documentaries nominated for the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature all had their world premieres at Sundance the previous year.
This tells us that there is considerable interest in documentaries, not only in true stories, but also in perspectives rooted in reality on subjects, challenges or ideas that are affecting the country and the world. And it is exciting to see here in Cannes an openness and a growing space being given to documentaries for the public – and we hope this trend will continue to grow.
The US at Cannes 2026
In the running for the Palme d’Or:
Ira Sachs: The Man I Love
James Gray: Paper Tiger
In the running for the l'Œil d'Or ("the Golden Eye") award for best documentary:
Ron Howard: Avedon
Joshua and Rebecca Tickell: Groundswell
Steven Soderbergh: John Lennon: The Last Interview
Mike Mendez: Dernsie: The Amazing Life of Bruce Dern
Barnaby Thompson: Maverick: The Epic Adventures of David Lean
_______________________________________________________________________
This article has been adapted from the original version in French by Siegfried Forster.
