In May each year, the international film industry convenes on the French Riveria for one of cinema’s most glamorous events: the Cannes Film Festival. As well as a select band of films competing for the prestigious Palme d'Or, this most famous of film festivals also represents a frantic marketplace for distributors and filmmakers looking to secure deals and create some early buzz for a wide range of movies.

To honour the commencement of this year’s festival, EntSight is proud to present our latest analysis tool Limelight to provide audience insight for films featured at Cannes – both past and present.

Introducing Limelight

Building on a similar approach and methodology to what we’ve developed for our winning Constellation solution for Brands & Entertainment, Limelight is able to identify the key conversational trends which drive the success of movies and TV shows.

Using Limelight we can understand the key aspects of Film and TV conversations such as the impact of trailers, how the cast resonated with audiences and whether controversial subjects may have positive or negatively influenced a movies impact.

And now, through analysis of three standout Cannes movies from recent years we’ve been able to put Limelight to the test….

Toni Erdmann (Official Selection – Cannes 2016)

Premiering at the Cannes Festival in 2016, this critically lauded German comedy tells a gently satirical tale of a father trying to reconnect with his daughter via a series of increasingly elaborate Dadaist pranks. The film was warmly received at the festival itself, where it was in competition for the Palme d’Or, before going on to be nominated for a multitude of awards – including Best Foreign Language Film at the 2017 Academy Awards. Using Limelight, we are able to pinpoint the factors of the acclaimed comedy which audiences responded to the most.