L'Inconnue

Screened in competition at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, L'Inconnue marks Arthur Harari's return to directing after the success of Anatomy of a Fall, which he co-wrote. Starring Lea Seydoux and Niels Schneider, the film starts from a bold premise, a sexual encounter that triggers a body swap between the two lovers, to build a meditation on gender identity, desire and the gaze cast upon another's body. Critics called it one of the most divisive titles on the Croisette, some praised the conceptual clarity with which Harari turns a fantastical device into a meditation on intimacy, others found it overly cryptic.

com noted the film manages to be both unsettling and strangely moving, generating a mounting unease that lingers through the closing credits. Distributed by Neon in the US, by Pathe in France from August 26, 2026 and by Adler Entertainment in Italy under the title La sconosciuta, the film never depicts sexuality explicitly, instead using it as the narrative's keystone, the moment of physical intimacy becomes the threshold through which the characters lose and rediscover themselves. With a ten million euro budget and elegant, disorienting cinematography, L'Inconnue confirms Harari as one of the most original voices in contemporary French cinema, treating desire as philosophical territory before physical one.