Doc Talk In Cannes: Deadline Podcast Hosts American Pavilion Panel On Challenged State Of Documentary Industry

Matthew Carey

Tue, May 27, 2025 at 11:54 PM UTC

2 min read

The Cannes Film Festival recently concluded, attracting a star-studded lineup including Tom Cruise, Jennifer Lawrence, and Robert Pattinson.
The documentary "The Six Billion Dollar Man," focusing on Julian Assange, won a Special Jury Prize at Cannes, marking the 10th anniversary of the L’Oeil d’or award for top documentaries.
Documentary filmmakers are increasingly adopting a territory-by-territory approach for distribution, with some considering self-distribution due to changes in the industry landscape.

Another glamorous Cannes Film Festival has ended, after an exciting fortnight on the Côte d’Azur that drew the likes of Tom Cruise, Jennifer Lawrence, Emma Stone, Scarlett Johansson, Robert Pattinson, Denzel Washington, Paul Mescal, Kristen Stewart, Bono and many others.

Stars of documentaries also turned up: Shia LaBeouf, whose exploits as founder of a free theater company in L.A. are chronicled in Slauson Rec , and Julian Assange, focus of the documentary The Six Billion Dollar Man . The latter film, directed by Eugene Jarecki, won a Special Jury Prize , marking the 10th anniversary of the L’Oeil d’or award, which goes to the top documentary at Cannes. Imago , directed by Chechen filmmaker Déni Oumar Pitsaev , took the 2025 L’Oeil d’or prize.

More from Deadline

For the first time, Deadline’s Doc Talk podcast traveled to Cannes to record interviews and to moderate a panel at the American Pavilion. Today’s episode of the show is built around our AmPav discussion on the state of the documentary industry, which featured panelists Vanessa Hope, director of Invisible Nation ; Joe Tufano, VP Distribution at Submarine Entertainment; and Catherine Quantschnigg, Noah Media Group’s Producer, Sales.

Tufano explains how documentary filmmakers increasingly are moving to a territory-by-territory approach to sell their features in the absence of acquisitions for worldwide distribution. Hope tells us why she considered going the self-distribution route in the U.S. for her award-winning film that explores Taiwan as it contends with almost daily threats from mainland China. And Quantschnigg reveals how the distribution landscape has changed dramatically in only a few years since Netflix acquired Noah Media Group’s acclaimed film 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible .

That’s on the latest edition of the Doc Talk podcast, hosted by Oscar winner John Ridley ( 12 Years a Slave , Shirley ) and Matt Carey, Deadline’s documentary editor. The pod is a production of Deadline and Ridley’s Nō Studios.

Listen to the episode above or on major podcast platforms including Spotify , iHeart and Apple .

Best of Deadline

Entertainment: