All The Documentaries Showing at Cannes in 2025
Are there any documentaries showing at the Cannes Film Festival in 2025?
The documentary genre is almost completely absent from this year’s edition of the iconic festival, with just one film, Raoul Peck’s Orwell : 2+2=5, featuring in the Cannes Premiere section of the 69-film strong Official Selection.
Historically, non-fiction has always been overlooked at Cannes. There seemed to be signs of this changing in recent years, with a significant number of documentaries breaking into the official selection, including films by Wang Bing, Claire Simon, Steve McQueen and Sergei Loznitsa, and even a few hybrid formats by less established filmmakers. But whereas we’re seeing that trend carry through in other major European festivals like Berlinale, who now regularly deliver the Golden Bear to documentaries, non-fiction selections are waning in Cannes.
Only two documentaries have ever been awarded the Palme d’Or. The first was Jacques Cousteau’s Le Monde du silence in 1996, followed by Farenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore in 2004.
However, this year does mark the 10th anniversary of L’Oeil d’Or, the Cannes Film festival documentary award. Created in collaboration with La Scam and INA in 2015, it can not only be presented to any film of the Official Selection, but it also invites films from the parallel selections of the Directors’ Fortnight (Quinzaine des cinéastes) and Critics’ Week (Semaine de la critique) to participate.
Indeed, it’s in the parallel selections that this year’s documentary gems are to be found. Not least Put your soul on your hand and walk by Sepideh Farsi in the ACID Cannes selection, which has drawn international attention since the film’s main protagonist, Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona, was tragically and illegally murdered in a targeted Israeli missile strike before the film could be screened.
So, here are the 8 documentaries that we’ve gleaned from this year’s official and parallel Cannes Film Festival selections…
1. Orwell : 2+2=5 by Raoul Peck
Official Selection - Cannes Premiere
Produced by Alex Gibney’s Jigsaw Productions and made in collaboration with the Orwell estate, the film will delve deep into George Orwell’s final months and legacy, including his bestselling novel “1984.”
Cannes chief Thierry Frémaux said at the festival’s press conference that Peck’s film would look at “the strength and relevance of his ideas, and his anticipation of what will become of societies if we don’t take care of them. That was in the ’30s and ’40s. We didn’t pay enough attention to that and maybe we’re not very far from it now; that’s the thesis of this film.”
Peck spoke more about the film and its relevance to current US politics during his recent Masterclass as Guest of honour at Visions du Réel.
Orwell : 2+2=5 by Raoul Peck
2. Militantropos by Yelizaveta Smith, Alina Gorlova & Simon Mozgovyi
Directors Fortnight - Feature competition
MILITANTROPOS captures the human condition through the fractured realities of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The film pieces together everyday lives transformed by war — those who flee, those who lose everything, and those who stay to resist and fight — tracing both the instinct to survive and the need for closeness.
Amid devastation and atrocity, the human is absorbed into war — and war, in turn, becomes part of the human.
Statement of the Quinzaine des Cinéastes: "A Ukrainian documentary by a trio of Ukrainian directors: Alina Gorlova, Yelizaveta Smith and Simon Mozgovyi. An essential film in terms of its subject matter, it brings back never-before-seen images - the likes of which we don't see in the media - of villages under bombardment, and shows us the Ukrainian inhabitants forced to get used to the state of war. Without judgment, with great compassion for this aggressed population. It's a documentary about the Ukraine like very few others have ever seen."
Militantropos by Yelizaveta Smith, Alina Gorlova & Simon Mozgovyi
3. +10K by Gala Hernández López
Directors Fortnight - Shorts competition
Pol is 21 and lives with his grandmother. He dreams of living in Miami and generating +10k a month. He attends personal development events, follows online coaches and invests in cryptocurrencies. Pol doesn’t know when he’ll reach his goals of becoming the best version of himself. The only thing he knows is that one day, he’ll get there.
+10K by Gala Hernández López
4. Critical Condition by Mila Zhluktenko
Critics’ Week - Shorts Competition
Inspired by the events around the life of Lev Rebet, Ukrainian author and editor-in-chief of the Munich-based exile newspaper Ukrainian Independist, Critical Condition portrays the fates of the Ukrainian diaspora in the past and present.
Critical Condition by Mila Zhluktenko
5. L’mina by Randa Maroufi
Critics’ Week - Shorts Competition
Jerada is a mining town in Morocco, where coal extraction - officially halted in 2001 - has continued informally to this day. L’mina reconstructs current activity in the pits through a set designed in collaboration with the local residents, who perform their own roles on screen.
L’mina by Randa Maroufi
6. Obscure Night - "Ain't I a child?" by Sylvain George
ACID Cannes
Obscure Night traces the path of young exiles through the nights of Paris. Between furtive gestures and vibrant presences, it sketches youth as a power of being, and brings forth, through silence and duration, other ways of inhabiting the world.
The film had its world premiere at Visions du Réel.
Obscure Night - "Ain't I a child?" by Sylvain George
7. Put your soul on your hand and walk by Sepideh Farsi
ACID Cannes
“Put your soul on your hand and walk was my response as a filmmaker, to the ongoing massacre of the Palestinians. My personal way not to lose my sanity. A miracle happened when I met Fatem through a Palestinian friend. Ever since, she became my eyes in Gaza, while surviving under the bombs and documenting the war. And I, became her connection to the outside world, from her Gaza prison, as she puts it. We kept this line of life going for more than 200 days. The bits of pixels and sounds that we exchanged constitute the film that you see. Fatem's assasination on April 16, 2025, following an Israeli attack on her home has forever changed its meaning.”
Put your soul on your hand and walk has garnered a lot of attention since the tragic and illegal killing of Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona, the film’s main protagonist, and her family by a targeted Israeli missile strike on her home on the 16th of April.
You can read a statement by the ACID Cannes team here that shares words published by the director Sepideh Farsi in response.
Put your soul on your hand and walk by Sepideh Farsi
8. Life After Siham by Namir Abdel Messeeh
ACID Cannes
When Siham passed away, Namir didn’t realize that she was gone forever. In a child’s mind, mothers are immortal… To keep her memory alive, Namir delves into his family history across Egypt and France. With the cinema of Youssef Chahine as his companion, a story of exile — and above all, of love — begins to unfold.
Life After Siham by Namir Abdel Messeeh
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