Thierry Frémaux then signed a pledge from LenCollectifm 50/50, the French association dedicated to promoting sexual and gender diversity in the film industry. The pledge outlined steps the festival would take to move toward greater inclusion of women in its lineup, including generating gendered statistics for its annual program, while working toward achieving gender equity in its governing bodies and programming committees.

At the 2026 festival’s opening press conference on May 12, Cannes boss Frémaux offered: “Films are chosen for their quality, not the gender of their directors.”

When asked about its efforts to reach parity in the festival’s competition, a spokesperson for the fest said: “Cannes Film Festival has been committed to gender parity for several years across all areas directly under its responsibility.”

“The word quota is scaring everybody,” says Fanny de Casimacker of Le Collectif 50/50. “People in the industry are always giving responsibility to someone else. We really think that every single step of the film industry has a big responsibility.”

But this number dwindles to just 22 percent in the festival’s competition program, which features films that often go on to win awards and land top distribution deals.

“We’re having a really hard time breaking through the auteur glass ceiling. There is still the perception that auteurs are men,” says Women in Film CEO Kirsten Schaffer (Chloé Zhao and Jane Campion are the exception). At Cannes, a festival that bills itself as the global home of auteurs, female directors face even more biases.

This year’s Un Certain Regard has the highest percentage of women directors, with 10 out of the 19 films. “What Un Certain Regard shows us is that it is possible. If the main competition really wanted to, they could,” says Schaffer, who points to other prestigious festivals’ recent history of adding more women to competition sections.

Of the 22 films in the Berlin Film Fest competition, nine were directed by women.

Sundance Film Festival has had parity in its U.S. Dramatic Competition section for several years. Seventy percent of the films in the 2026 competition lineup were directed by women.

Several of the issues that keep women directors from the highest echelons of the film industry are systemic, from education and mentorship to financing and distribution. In 2019, when only 4 competition films were directed by women, Frémaux argued: “Cannes and any festival, we are the last stage of that journey.”

“We have a global crisis in how independent cinema is financed, and it is affecting women and marginalized people first,” says de Casimacker.

Schaffer and her team at WIF have a shorthand for this phenom: “When the money comes in, the women go out.” She says. “For every Book Club, you have many Jason Statham action thrillers.”

Filmmaker Daphne Schmon launched the nonprofit Breaking Through the Lens in 2018 at Cannes, coincidentally the same year of the demonstration on the steps of the Palais. The organization’s focus is on helping females find avenues to financing through grants, curated meetings and industry mentorship. Says Schmon: “We purposely focus on the financing stage, because that where the problem lies, and that’s where change needs to happen.”

Stewart talked about the difficulties she faced when in financing her directorial debut, The Chronology of Water. While goodwill for females is high, this doesn’t translate to funding. “There’s a lot of wanting to get better. But when push comes to shove, there are very few people who are putting their money where their mouth is.”

Zhang is buoyed by the amount of female talent set for Cannes premieres this year, but says there remains a crisis when it comes to decision-making. “People are still threatened by females, they don’t want to recognize female authority,” says Zhang. “It’s an ego blocking their way, or they’re not confident that a woman can make things happen as [well] as men can.”

Some countries, like Sweden, have implemented quotas for the funding that comes out of their film commissions. One of the women-directed competition titles at this year’s Cannes, Gentle Monster from Marie Kreutzer, is a Swedish co-production.

Says Elizabeth: “When we have organizations that can give opportunities to different voices, then] we can see the landscape shifting.”

Progress has been made, it’s just not at the speed that was promised. “It’s a very slow evolution,” says de Casimacker.

Female representation in the director’s chair is currently in a precarious situation, domestically. The larger American entertainment industry, which has slashed diversity programs and is currently in a period of retrenchment due to economic headwinds, has also backslid in terms of representation in the director’s chair.

In 2025, the number of female directors behind the top 100 grossing films hit a seven-year low, with women representing just 8.1 percent of all directors on these films, according to USC.

Source: Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Women in Film, Cannes Film Fest Data