Park Chan-wook will be the president of the jury of the 79th Cannes Film Festival

A great first for a Korean director.

After Spike Lee, Vincent Lindon, Ruben Östlund, Greta Gerwig and Juliette Binoche last year, it is Park Chan-wook who will have the honor and heavy responsibility of being the president of the jury of the Cannes Film Festival which will designate the Palme d’Or next May.

Park Chan-wook has never won this famous Palme, but he has rarely left the Croisette empty-handed. Already in 2004, he won the Grand Prix with Old Boythen the Jury Prize with Thirst: this is my blood in 2009, the Directing Prize with Decision to Leave in 2022.

This choice therefore consolidates the beautiful story between the filmmaker and the Festival. And it also confirms the rise of Korean cinema in Cannes, culminating in Bong Joon-ho’s Palme d’Or in 2019 for Parasite. For the first time, a Korean will occupy the position of President of the Jury.

“We are delighted to celebrate his immense talent and more broadly this total cinema of a country anchored in the questions of our time“, underline Iris Knobloch, President of the Cannes Film Festival, and Thierry Frémaux, General Delegate, in the press release accompanying this announcement.

Park Chan-wook is one of the most striking and unique voices in world cinema, a director with an always sharp eye, as evidenced by his latest film, No other choicecurrently showing in France.

In his statement, he proclaims his love for the cinema, this place where we cloister ourselves in the dark.for the soul to be released through the window that is the film“:

“I am impatient to experience this double voluntary captivity with the members of the Jury: being locked in to watch a film, being locked in to discuss the film. In this time of hatred and division, I believe that the simple act of gathering in a cinema to watch a film at the same time, synchronizing our breaths and our heartbeats, creates solidarity, moving and universal.

The Cannes Film Festival will take place from Tuesday May 12 to Saturday May 23, 2026. The selection will be revealed like every year in mid-April.