The 79th Cannes Film Festival, which opens with Pierre Salvadori's *La Vénus électrique*, marks the 25th anniversary of Thierry Frémaux's directorship, who presents an edition conspicuously absent from major American studio films. The competition is dominated by returning names such as Hamaguchi, Almodóvar, and Farhadi, with Andrei Zvyagintsev offering a diagnosis of wartime Russia in exile with *Minotaur*. International co-productions have become the norm, prompting Frémaux to reflect on the significance of national cinema. AI forms a central axis of tension, with the main competition deliberately barring the use of AI while Kore-eda's *Sheep in the Box* and Soderbergh's *John Lennon: The Last Interview* substantively fuel the debate.