The Oppressive State in the Past and Present, as Reflected in Four Films in the Competition

A common feature that emerged across various titles shown in Competition during the 78th Cannes Film Festival — and especially in the four discussed in this report — was the omnipresence of the oppressive state, either as a backdrop or as an active “character” in dramatic conflicts. Watching these films together – which reflect both past and present – not only draws fine distinctions but also reveals striking parallels between officially recognized dictatorships and political systems promoted as democratic, while subtly exposing their use of totalitarian methods to eliminate inconvenient forms of justice.

“The Secret Agent” (Brazil/France/Netherlands/Germany, dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho) – our FIPRESCI choice for the best film in Competition – unfolds a near-surreal narrative that moves between São Paulo, Brasília, and the director’s hometown of Recife, all set against the backdrop of Brazil’s military dictatorship in the 1970s. It is not strictly a film about the regime, but it inhabits that era and its atmosphere – generates a pervasive sense of mystery, fear, and buried histories; the politics that shape people’s lives. Wagner Moura’s character, Marcelo, arrives in Recife under ambiguous circumstances: Who is he? What is he fleeing? What danger is following him? These questions unfold gradually as he interacts with some fifty characters, slowly uncovering the logic of an oppressive state and the coping mechanisms of those who live under its pressure. Mendonça Filho’s detailed research into that environment clearly stems from an urge to revive the historical landscape in a battle against collective amnesia, and to place emphasis on seemingly “unimportant” people and events that have dissolved in the grind of time, while in fact forming its living fabric. But it is also a direct “blood transfusion” between past and present, as suggested by the film’s final chapter. The present is not immune to the repressive practices of the past, and corruption flows through the veins – especially when public memory has faded, the film seems to imply. In this sense, “The Secret Agent” stands as the strongest example of an urge for historical continuity among the Competition titles, delivered with uninhibited imagination in the most cinematic way.

In the 2025 Palm d’Or winner, “It Was Just an Accident” (Iran/France/Luxembourg, dir. Jafar Panahi), the current Iranian dictatorship is never directly addressed, but its presence permeates the relationships between people and the overall discourse. A simple road accident, which facilitates a chance encounter between perpetrator and victim; a servant of the regime and its opponent — unleashes a hurricane of rage and a thirst for vengeance that crashes onto the screen with uncensored brutality. However, Panahi’s film is not a mere description of a poisoned society by toxic politics; it is instead a search for an antidote, eventually found in the surviving human capacity for compassion that has transcended the everyday “banal evil” of authoritarianism.

What starts out as a mission of revenge slowly evolves into an in-depth exploration of morality, while a dormant sense of humanity stirs. Jafar Panahi transforms an initially looking like a dusty road thriller into a profoundly life-affirming odyssey. Along the way, the lines between friend and foe begin to dissolve, the urgency of action becomes untethered from time, and political ideologies give way to deeper existential imperatives. By the time the journey ends, the film has shed many of its original certainties – an intentional and powerful move that underscores its core strength: the courage to interrogate its own premises and to strive beyond the immediately political, even when shaped by personal trauma. The film becomes, in essence, a generous act of cinematic confession – one that conveys Panahi’s unwavering resolve to expose the regime’s mechanisms, yet also his willingness to imagine reconciliation with those it manipulates, all in the hope of a more humane tomorrow.

Going back again to the past, but mostly to use it as a bridge to the present, “Two Prosecutors” (France/ Germany/ Netherlands/ Latvia/ Romania/ Lithuania, dir. Sergei Loznitsa) transports us to the Soviet 1937, the dreadful period of Stalin’s Great Purge. Based on the memoir book of the same title by Georgy Demidov, a scientist and political prisoner of the USSR. The plot of the film begins to unravel with a prisoner’s letter written in blood – eventually taken seriously by a young prosecutor, still naive and untainted by the state’s murky affairs. His unshakable belief that he is serving an institution striving for a just future for all leads him into a winding labyrinth of Kafkaesque bureaucracy, where administrative hurdles function as both subtle and explicit warnings: digging too deep is ill-advised. What stands out as rarely seen in Loznitsa’s portrayal of the period is that, unlike most films about the Stalinist terror, where the narrative unfolds through characters already victimized by the regime, and the repressive apparatus is exposed from the outset, here, the protagonist, though increasingly suspicious, remains officially in the dark. Despite the ordeals he faces, the viewer is presented, for much of the film, with a seemingly well-functioning state structure – one that could easily be likened to any contemporary democratic system. What elevates “Two Prosecutors” beyond a historical adaptation into the realm of universal parable is its exploration of the dynamic between those in power, the executors of their directives, and the subordinates whose rights evaporate the moment someone dares to disrupt the established chain of command – a parable that resonates across all eras and political systems.

In its tedious and ultimately fruitless journey through layers of administrative obstruction in pursuit of the truth, the real-events-based “Case 137” (France, dir. Dominik Moll) feels like a mirror plot to “Two Prosecutors” but set in contemporary France, just a few years ago during the Yellow Vest protests.

Stéphanie, played by Léa Drucker, is an Internal Affairs investigator – part of the police force’s own oversight mechanism – tasked with probing an alleged case of police brutality during a street riot in a rough neighborhood. As she digs deeper into the events surrounding the use of a riot gun’s blast ball, which left a young man severely injured, she begins to face resistance from within the institution. The growing pressure from her superiors doesn’t just obstruct the investigation – it compels her to confront and question the very foundations of her own beliefs.

What feels particularly disempowering is the transparency with which, when a crime is committed by the police, the law admits that it lacks the means to hold the perpetrators accountable. And that those who abide by the law – who should be protected by its enforcers – are, in fact, left unprotected, especially from those very enforcers. Eventually, it turns out that if, during the Stalinist terror, an official attempting to reform the system from within is clearly shown that it won’t end well for him, because the law simply doesn’t apply, then in today’s rule-of-law democracy, France, such a figure is free to dismantle injustice in peace. Because even when it is exposed, the law knows how to quietly slip away.

Public systems have certainly evolved, suggests “Case 137” – above all in refining their mechanisms of self-preservation against their own citizens, while presenting them as civilized solutions.

Mariana Hristova
©FIPRESCI