French actress Leïla Bekhti has been announced as President of the Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard Jury.

She will be joined by Senegalese producer Angèle Diabang, Lebanon’s composer Khaled Mouzanar, Italy’s director Laura Samani, and France’s director Thomas Cailley.

Bekhti follows in the footsteps of UK filmmaker Molly Manning Walker in 2025 whose jury awarded Chilean filmmaker Diego Céspedes the Un Certain Regard Prize for his debut filmThe Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo.

“For my first time as Jury President, I will find myself in the unique position of watching, listening, sharing, and celebrating. Working in cinema has taught me that movies are places of encounter with others, with oneself, with the world,” said Bekhti.

“Discovering them alongside a jury, living this timeless experience, is both a responsibility and a joy. I look forward to the exchanged perspectives, the dialogues, and the doubts as well, which make up the richness of this living art. And, ultimately, I will be there in the most precious seat of all: that of the audience.”

Bekhti first came to the public’s attention in Jacques Audiard’s A Prophet (2009), with more recent credits including Gilles Lellouche’s Sink or Swim (2018), Joachim Lafosse’s The Restless (2021), Kheiron’s All Three of Us (2015), Perfect Nanny (2019), Jeanne Herry’s All Your Faces (2023), and Ken Scott’s Once Upon My Mother (2025). She will soon appear in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Changer l’eau des fleurs.

Cannes Un Certain Regard opens with Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma. The 79th Cannes Film Festival runds from May 12 to May 23.