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Ruben Östlund is squarely focused on nabbing a third consecutive Palme d’Or, but the Swedish filmmaker tells Deadline that he may not return to the Cannes Film Festival until 2027 with his recently shot feature, The Entertainment System Is Down.
“At the end of February, we’re going to decide whether to go to Cannes this year, or actually wait and edit one more year before we release the film,” Östlund told Deadline from the Göteborg Film Festival, where the filmmaker held a career Q&A session this week.
Östlund added that he is currently in the editing process, which he believes will require a uniquely long timeframe because the “material is so huge.”
“Today, you can map out all your images in a VR set, so you know exactly where the camera is going to stand. So when you get to the actual set, the camera is constantly rolling. And now, when I’m editing, I basically have to edit down 60 minutes of material to a one-minute scene. So it’s a huge amount of material and will take a long time, and I have to pay the material respect.
The Entertainment System Is Down is Östlund’s follow-up to the Palme d’Or-winning satire Triangle of Sadness. The film is a social satire set on a long-haul flight where the entertainment systems fail, and an eclectic group of international passengers are forced to face the horror of being bored.
Östlund told us that when he does land back on the Croisette with The Entertainment System Is Down, he has his eyes set on making history by winning a third consecutive Palme d’Or. Östlund took the award in 2022 with Triangle of Sadness and The Square 2022.
“Just as a fantasy, it’s too strong not to think about it,” Östlund said. “So, of course, that is something that is on my mind constantly. It’s hard to talk about these things because you sound arrogant. But for me to use a high set goal is to also push my own ability up and push up the quality of the project. So as soon as you are making a decision, you have to think, is this the right decision to achieve our goal, which is to win the third Golden Palme.”
Kirsten Dunst, Daniel Brühl, and Keanu Reeves are among the film’s leading cast. Also starring are Julie Delpy, Nicholas Braun, Tobias Menzies, Connor Swindells, Daniel Webber, Wayne Blair, Dan Wyllie, Lindsay Duncan, Allan Corduner, Sofia Tjelta Sydness, Erin Ainsworth, Myles Kamwendo, Elle Piper, Thibaud Dooms, Sanna Sundqvist, Tea Stjärne, Swedish artist Benjamin Ingrosso, and Sanjeev Bhaskar.
The project pre-sold to a bunch of territories, including the UK (Lionsgate Films), Germany & Austria (Alamode Film / Wild Bunch Germany), Italy (Lucky Red / Teodora Film), Australia and New Zealand (Sharmill Films), Canada (Elevation Pictures), Spain (Elástica / BTeam Pictures). A24 has U.S. rights to the film. And Östlund had some interesting opinions on the current state of theatrical distribution.
“The cinema is now the only space where we have a collective experience when it comes to the moving image. So the cinema has a more important role now than it had in the recent past,” he said, pointing to how apps like TikTok and YouTube dominate people’s attention. “But I’m a little bit worried about the big owners who own all the cinemas and aren’t taking care of the collective experience.”
Östlund continued to say that Göteborg Film Festival and all film festivals are a “good example of how to uphold that collective experience.”
“Göteborg Film Festival is selling more tickets than it ever has. The media coverage is more extensive every year. So the interest in cinema and films, when the event is taken care of, is huge,” he added. “But the cinema as a product for the entertainment industry, where you just go to a Cineplex, and it’s in and out? I understand why that is not so interesting anymore, because we have to sell the collective experience.”
English (US) ·