The 11 movies we're most excited to see at the Cannes Film Festival

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We’re en route to the 79th Cannes Film Festival, which begins Tuesday and runs for another 10 days of manic movie watching, along with the slow, stunned walk of post-screening euphoria (or the opposite).Before taking in another edition of what is dependably the most significant cinema showcase in the world, Times film critic Amy Nicholson and film editor Joshua Rothkopf batted around some hopes and prejudgments — all sight unseen — of a lineup that’s sure to yield gold.Joshua Rothkopf: First, let’s talk about who’s not going to Cannes this year: American directors.

Apart from Ira Sachs’ “The Man I Love” and James Gray’s late addition “Paper Tiger,” no U.S.films have been invited to compete for the Palme d’Or.

This bucks a recent trend: Sean Baker world-premiered his “Anora” at Cannes in 2024 and, at least lately, the festival has been the launching pad for some risky homegrown dares that I’ve loved, like Ari Aster’s future classic “Eddington.” You don’t even have Tom Cruise rappelling in for a “Mission: Impossible” gala.I’m only semi-OK with this.I want Cannes to feel, at least for a week, like the galaxy-brained center of movie nerd-dom.

A big dice-roll like Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis” is definitely a part of that.My itch will be scratched, hopefully, by “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma,” the meta-horror latest from Jane Schoenbrun (“I Saw the TV Glow”), opening the Un Certain Regard section, which also includes American Jordan Firstman’s debut feature “Club Kid.” And Cannes has a way of surprising you from the margins.

It’s where Demi Moore kicked off her gooey comeback with “The Substance.” But I look at this year’s official poster — Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis striking a steely pose from 1991’s “Thelma & Louise” — and can’t help but wonder if Hollywood has changed ir...