Cannes: All the Palme d’Or Winners, Ranked

THR critics sifted through all 69 past winners of Cannes' coveted top prize and put them in order from bottom of the barrel (sorry, Bille August) to creme de la creme (hint: a timeless Italian masterpiece starring Burt Lancaster).

May 10, 2016 9:55pm

Cannes Palme d'Or Winners, Ranked — Miramax/Photofest

Critics are a contentious bunch. But when it came to ranking all 69 Palme d'Or winners, THR’s film reviewers attending Cannes this year — Todd McCarthy, Jon Frosch, David Rooney, Deborah Young, Leslie Felperin, Boyd van Hoeij and Jordan Mintzer — discovered, via a series of emails and phone conversations, that they were mostly on the same page (give or take some minor disagreement over where to place Blue Is the Warmest Color and which top five slot to award The Umbrellas of Cherbourg).

What's most apparent from the results is that the majority of the top 10 — and even 20 — films chosen were made several decades ago. Are critics nostalgic by nature? Or are movies just not what they used to be? That’s for you to decide.