Every Cannes Palme d'Or Winner Since 1990, Ranked
Updated May 27, 2023 with the 2023 Palme d'Or winner, Anatomy of a Fall.
A best picture Oscar may be film's peak honor, but a Cannes Palme d'Or win isn't far behind. Though it didn't adopt its current name (which translates to "Golden Palm" in English) on a permanent basis until 1975, the top award at the globe's most prestigious film festival has been handed out in nearly every year since 1946, with occasional interruptions (most recently in 2020, when the festival was canceled during the COVID pandemic).
Is the latest Palme d'Or winner a favorite with critics as well? Not every Palme d'Or recipient is, as Cannes juries (typically composed of actors and directors, and different every year) don't always have the same tastes as reviewers. In the gallery on this page, we rank all of the Cannes winners since 1990. They are arranged from worst to best by Metascore, which reflects the consensus of professional critics for each film.
1994 winner
It's hard to argue with this pick, but it was a tougher choice than it first seems. Quentin Tarantino's second and best feature wasn't able to take home a best picture Oscar (memorably losing to Forrest Gump), but it was able to collect the top award handed out by a Cannes jury led by Clint Eastwood. Pulp Fiction would become a surprise box office hit when it opened in theaters five months later, on its way to cementing its place on numerous lists of the greatest films of all time.
But there was worthy competition. Among the Cannes entries in 1994, the other immediate standout is Krzysztof Kieślowski's brilliant final film Red, which probably would have won the Palme d'Or in almost any other year (and also stands as one of the greatest films of all time). That film's Metascore? A perfect 100.
“It is an exhilaration from beginning to end. It's the movie equivalent of that rare sort of novel where you find yourself checking to see how many pages are left and hoping there are more, not fewer.” —Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Buy on |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|
| Stream On |
|