The Best Movies That Won the Palme d'Or at Cannes

Updated November 11, 2019 2.0k votes 233 voters 7.5k views61 items

List RulesGreatest movies to premiere at the Cannes Film Festival

Every year, the prestigious Cannes Film Festival lures in the greatest filmmaking talent in the entire world to show off their latest masterpieces. At the festival, critics have the chance to take the first peek at movies that may be seen as classics in decades to come. List of the best Palme d’Or Award winners from 1964 to 2014, as ranked by film critics and movie lovers. The greatest honor Cannes has to offer is the Palme d’Or, the award given to the director of the best feature film in the festival. Almost all Palme d’Or winning movies have gone on to be a critical and financial success. Previous winners, such as Pulp Fiction, Taxi Driver, and Apocalypse Now, have gone on to win other prestigious awards like Oscars and Golden Globes.

This list answers the question, “What are the best Palme d’Or winners?” The films on this list are emotionally honest, beautifully constructed, and brilliantly acted. The truest film buffs are sure to enjoy most of the movies on this list.

Whether you’re a fan of strange abstract films like Tree of Life or foreign language films which open you up to a whole new world, like Farewell My Concubine, there’s sure to be a movie or two on this list for you.

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Apocalypse Now
1979
Actors: Marlon Brando, Harrison Ford, Robert Duvall, Martin Sheen, Laurence Fishburne
Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
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Taxi Driver
1976
Actors: Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Martin Scorsese, Cybill Shepherd, Harvey Keitel
Directed by: Martin Scorsese
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Pulp Fiction
1994
Actors: John Travolta, Bruce Willis, Uma Thurman, Samuel L. Jackson, Christopher Walken
Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
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Paris, Texas
1984
Actors: Nastassja Kinski, Sam Shepard, Dean Stockwell, Harry Dean Stanton, Bernhard Wicki
Directed by: Wim Wenders
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Kagemusha
1980
Actors: Tatsuya Nakadai, Kenichi Hagiwara, Kaori Momoi, Jinpachi Nezu, Tsutomu Yamazaki
Directed by: Akira Kurosawa, Ishirō Honda
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The Conversation
1974
Actors: Harrison Ford, Robert Duvall, Gene Hackman, Teri Garr, Billy Dee Williams
Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
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The Mission
1986
Actors: Robert De Niro, Liam Neeson, Jeremy Irons, Aidan Quinn, Ronald Pickup
Directed by: Roland Joffé
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The Pianist
2002
Actors: Adrien Brody, Thomas Kretschmann, Emilia Fox, Maureen Lipman, Frank Finlay
Directed by: Roman Polanski
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The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
1964
Actors: Catherine Deneuve, Marc Michel, Nino Castelnuovo, Anne Vernon, Jean Champion
Directed by: Jacques Demy
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Blowup
1966
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Directed by: Michelangelo Antonioni
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Sex, Lies, and Videotape
1989
Actors: Andie MacDowell, James Spader, Laura San Giacomo, Peter Gallagher, Steven Brill
Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
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Amour
2012
Actors: Isabelle Huppert, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Emmanuelle Riva, Alexandre Tharaud, Dinara Drukarova
Directed by: Michael Haneke
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4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
2007
Actors: Anamaria Marinca, Teodor Corban, Vlad Ivanov, Alexandru Potocean, Luminița Gheorghiu
Directed by: Cristian Mungiu
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The Piano
1993
Actors: Anna Paquin, Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel, Sam Neill, Cliff Curtis
Directed by: Jane Campion
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Wild at Heart
1990
Actors: Nicolas Cage, Willem Dafoe, Isabella Rossellini, Laura Dern, Crispin Glover
Directed by: David Lynch
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MASH
1970
Actors: Robert Duvall, Donald Sutherland, Elliott Gould, Sally Kellerman, Rene Auberjonois
Directed by: Robert Altman
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All That Jazz
1979
Actors: Jessica Lange, John Lithgow, Roy Scheider, Wallace Shawn, Ben Vereen
Directed by: Bob Fosse
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if....
1968
Actors: Malcolm McDowell, Arthur Lowe, Richard Warwick, Mona Washbourne, David Wood
Directed by: Lindsay Anderson
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The Tree of Life
2011
Actors: Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain, Fiona Shaw, Tye Sheridan
Directed by: Terrence Malick
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Barton Fink
1991
Actors: John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Frances McDormand, John Turturro, Tony Shalhoub
Directed by: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
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Dancer in the Dark
2000
Actors: Björk, Catherine Deneuve, David Morse, Stellan Skarsgård, Peter Stormare
Directed by: Lars von Trier
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Eternity and a Day
1998
Actors: Bruno Ganz, Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Nikos Kouros, Isabelle Renauld, Despina Bebedelli
Directed by: Theo Angelopoulos
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Missing
1982
Actors: Jack Lemmon, Sissy Spacek, Melanie Mayron, Jerry Hardin, Richard Bradford
Directed by: Costa-Gavras
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Parasite
2019
Actors: Song Kang-ho, Lee Sun-kyun, Cho Yeo-jeong, Choi Woo-shik, Park So-dam
Directed by: Bong Joon-ho
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The Tin Drum
1979
Actors: Charles Aznavour, Mario Adorf, Daniel Olbrychski, David Bennent, Katharina Thalbach
Directed by: Volker Schlöndorff
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