Cristian Mungiu just won his second Palme d'Or at Cannes with Fjord, and the jury backed it up with four additional prizes. The film received a twelve minute standing ovation. Say what you want about Cannes ovations being performative. Twelve minutes is twelve minutes.
Fjord stars Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve as a couple who relocate to a remote Norwegian fjord village. The story draws from real cases involving Norwegian child welfare services, which immediately tells you the kind of territory Mungiu is working in. This is not a cozy relocation drama. If you know his work, you know he is drawn to institutions and the quiet violence they can inflict on ordinary people. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, the film that won him his first Palme d'Or back in 2007, was about a woman navigating an illegal abortion in Communist Romania. The man does not flinch from difficult material, and he does not sensationalize it either. He just puts the camera in the room and lets you feel the weight.
Stan is an interesting choice for this. He has been doing strong work in smaller films for years now, but most people still think of him as the Winter Soldier. This is the kind of role that could permanently shift how the industry sees him. Reinsve, meanwhile, has been one of the most exciting actors in European cinema since The Worst Person in the World. Putting these two together in a Mungiu film feels like a combination that was always going to produce something worth watching.
For Neon, the distributor, this is their seventh consecutive Palme d'Or acquisition. That streak started with Parasite in 2019, and they have been on a remarkable run of identifying the biggest film at the festival and locking it up. Whatever you think about Neon as a company, their taste in Cannes winners is hard to argue with.
The U.S. release is expected this fall, which puts Fjord right in the middle of awards season. Given the Palme d'Or and the reception, it will almost certainly be in the conversation for Best Picture and Best Director at the Oscars.
If you want to prepare for this one, watch Graduation first. It is the Mungiu film that best shows how he builds tension out of bureaucratic systems and moral compromise. Fjord sounds like it is operating in similar territory, just in a different country with different institutions doing the damage. I am very curious to see what Stan does with this material.
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