Neon’s Palme D’Or Whisperer Tom Quinn Reveals Keys To Cannes And Oscar Success: “I’m Happy To Share A Playbook”

There was time when studios thought premiering a film in Cannes in May could turn out to be a major hindrance to that movie’s Oscar chances nine months later. It was a logical assumption. Voters have short memories, and also, if the film doesn’t make a splash on the Croisette, it could be all over for its awards dreams. The fall festival trifecta of Venice, Telluride and Toronto became much “safer” (financially and otherwise), and a more logical bet to launch an Oscar campaign, requiring only six months post-launch to keep the contender alive rather than nine. After all, the Palme d’Or at Cannes and the Academy Award for Best Picture had matched only once since Marty won the first Palme in 1955.

That all changed in 2019, when Cannes’ Palme d’Or winner, South Korea’s Parasite, upset conventional thinking and went on to also triumph at the Oscars, ultimately taking the top prize there. It was the first time a foreign-language picture won the Best Picture Oscar and the top international film, and it has turned out to be a game-changer led by Neon founder and CEO Tom Quinn. Now, Neon has distributed in the U.S. the past five — count ‘em, five — Palme d’Or winners in a row, beginning with Parasite and followed by Titane, Triangle of Sadness, Anatomy of a Fall and Anora. The latter became the second Neon film to win both the Palme and the Best Picture Oscar. Additionally, both Triangle of Sadness and Anatomy of a Fall went on to receive Best Picture Oscar nominations, among other categories. Quite a track record, and proof positive that Neon has been instrumental in smashing the Cannes curse for Oscar (if it ever existed).

Quinn gives Thierry Frémaux much of the credit for selecting the lineups and saying it is just not happenstance. The Cannes Film Festival head is certainly aware of the shifting sands, as he pointed out while announcing this year’s films, even though he stated that a year ago he would not have been able to imagine the Oscar success of 2024 Cannes debuts like Anora, Emilia Pérez, The Substance and, for that matter, a whopping 31 nominations overall for Cannes titles. “If you look at the last seven, eight years, Cannes was great. I mean Cannes and the films of Cannes were great and awarded everywhere,” Frémaux said. “For the films I have just announced this morning, I really don’t know, but what I’m really happy about is the link between Cannes in May and the Academy Awards in March. You can arrive in Cannes in May and be still alive in March almost one year later.”

It is definitely something Quinn understands well, and that is one reason why Neon will be back on the Croisette this year with no less than four selections in the official lineups: Orwell, Splitsville, Sentimental Value and Alpha. The fact is, Quinn never had a master plan, and says going back to Parasite it never crossed his mind that, after seeing it in the late-night slot — following Quentin Tarantino’s much more hyped and anticipated studio juggernaut Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which went on to earn 10 Oscar nominations itself — it would go on to win both the Palme and Best Picture. Impossible, right?

“There wasn’t a direct intention behind it,” Quinn says. “But what I will tell you, what has always been large in my head, about Cannes, and it’s my favorite festival, absolutely, by far. Granted, the Riviera certainly helps. The Lumiere helps. Incredible programming team, but the films that have always seemed large for me were Wild at Heart, Sex, Lies, and Videotape, Apocalypse Now. I always had this very romanticized, nostalgic vision of what it meant for these huge American juggernauts. But that was the place that you got validated. The birthplace of cinema — France — and you know, to this day, France for me represents, I think, the safest harbor for cinema.”

With all Neon’s success at Cannes, and in particular winning the Palme d’Or, the company later tests each of their films in the San Fernando Valley, and Quinn says increasingly the fact they won the Palme is the No. 1 driver of audience attendance at those previews. “And you have to remember that a lot of voters, while it may only be sending jury members that sit on that committee in Cannes, they’re all, if not the vast majority, also Academy voters. So, I think it makes perfect sense, combined with having a really nice lead time, to be able to build a significant campaign, to focus on the theatrical window, and position your film properly. So, each of these films have been released, essentially, the same release date in October. You know, I’m happy to share our playbook because it’s so obvious.”

In the case of Anora, he says they had not even tested the film before Cannes and had only seen it in early cuts. “Winning the Palme d’Or, having been there four times previous, you know, we went in to do the work, the work that we do. We go and test the movie, we obviously combine that with where we are critically, and then we do an assessment of where the prognosticators sit, you know, the 80-plus prognosticators, where do they sit across the Oscar race?” he says. ”And so, all of those things collectively, in any one silo, may not mean a lot. But if you take that data set, and you compare it to four other movies, three of which have already been Best Picture nominees, one of which had won, you have a really good concept of where you’re going. We knew back in July that this had a really strong path towards securing six Oscar nominations … And I have to say it was pretty stressful. You know, be careful what you wish for, and to hold steadfast, and be confident. It’s a marathon. We went through the ebbs and flows of the campaign but always believed that we could get where we got to. So, getting these six Oscar nominations was a celebration, but also a relief that we weren’t crazy back in July.”

Quinn also credits Cannes premieres and wins in other categories for eventual success getting to the Oscars, such as the Best Actor win in Cannes for Perfect Days. which went on to be nominated for the International Feature Oscar, or the exposure for a sleeper, Robot Dreams, which cashed in goodwill at Cannes for a surprise Animated Feature Oscar nomination. He compared it to Flow, which was a hit in Cannes and went on to win this year’s Animated Feature for indie partners Sideshow and Janus against huge, well-oiled competition from DreamWorks, Disney/Pixar and Netflix. Flow was also up for Best International Feature from first-timer Latvia.

Does Quinn think the increased international voting bloc in the Academy is making a difference now and making it easier for Cannes to become such a big player? “I think it’s definitely a swing vote, but I would say it still only represents less than 25% of over 9,000 voters,” he says. “The Academy overall has increased quite rapidly in size, but not just new international voters, but also younger voters. Regardless of age, newer voters, I think, are more energized and participate more, and watch more, and vote first. I would say that new membership, younger membership, overlaps I think pretty extensively with international membership, and it’s having a big decisive impact on where these awards are going, because they watch the movies, because they are voting.”

At any rate, there is no doubt we will be seeing a lot of Quinn and his Neon team all over Cannes, whether promoting the films they are bringing or looking to find the next Parasite and Anora that just might travel all the way from the Grand Théâtre Lumière in the South of France to the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood.