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Barnard’s I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning Wins Cannes Directors’ Fortnight Audience Award

The €7,500 prize supported by the Fondation Chantal Akerman boosts the film’s festival momentum while Charades handles world sales and Curzon holds U.K. rights.

Review: I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning
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The audience crowns I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning as its champion in the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight

Overview

  • The film, which premiered on Wednesday in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, took the section’s People’s Choice Audience Award in voting by festivalgoers.
  • The Audience Award carries a €7,500 bursary funded by the Fondation Chantal Akerman, a prize introduced by the Fortnight in 2024 to spotlight crowd favorites.
  • Charades acquired world sales in the run-up to Cannes and Curzon secured U.K. distribution, giving the film immediate market traction and helping push plans for wider theatrical deals.
  • Critics broadly praised the ensemble performances and the film’s focus on working‑class life and housing precarity, while several reviews faulted heavy‑handed sentiment, choppy editing and uneven plotting.
  • Other Fortnight prizes named at Cannes included Sarah Arnold’s Too Many Beasts winning the Europa Cinemas Label and Lila Pinell’s Shana taking the SACD Coup de Cœur, which together shape what European exhibitors and buyers will promote next.