Neon has acquired the North American distribution rights to “The Unknown” (“L’Inconnue”), which stars Palme d’Or winner Léa Seydoux (“Dune: Part Two,” “The Beast”), the distributor announced on Friday.
The film will be written and directed by Academy Award winner Arthur Harari. Neon will theatrically release “The Unknown” in U.S. and Canada in 2026. It will be produced by bathysphere, with Pathé co-producing and selling the film internationally in Cannes. Plot details are being kept under wraps.
“The Unknown” is the third feature both written and directed by Harari, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall,” for which he also won a BAFTA and a Golden Globe. His previous feature as writer-director was 2021’s “Onoda: 10,000 Nights in the Jungle,” which opened Un Certain Regard at Cannes that year and went on to win numerous awards, including the Best Original Screenplay César.
Harari also wrote the screenplay for “Sibyl” (2019), also directed by Triet, which was in the Official Competition at Cannes that year.
The deal was negotiated by Neon’s president of Acquisitions & Production Jeff Deutchman with producer Nicolas Anthomé on behalf of the filmmakers. It marks Neon’s second collaboration with Harari following last year’s “Anatomy of a Fall,” which Neon acquired out of Cannes in 2023 before it won the Palme d’Or. This deal further cements Neon’s commitment to bringing top-of-the-line international cinema to U.S. audiences.
Neon’s slate currently includes Steven Soderbergh’s “Presence,” which made its world premiere at Sundance; “Keeper” from Osgood Perkins, starring Tatiana Maslany and Rossif Sutherland; and “They Follow,” the long-awaited sequel to the modern horror classic “It Follows” from writer/director David Robert Mitchell, starring Maika Monroe.
At this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Neon will be premiering “Anora” in Competition, the new film from Sean Baker (“The Florida Project,” “Red Rocket”) starring Mikey Madison. Neon’s upcoming slate includes Pamela Adlon’s directorial debut, “Babes,” which premiered at this year’s SXSW and opens May 17; Academy Award-nominee for Best Animated Feature “Robot Dreams” from Pablo Berger, which comes to U.S. theaters on May 31; “Longlegs” from Perkins, starring Nicolas Cage and Monroe, releasing in theaters July 12; and Tilman Singer’s “Cuckoo,” starring Hunter Schafer and Dan Stevens, in theaters August 2.
Neon also recently scooped the North American rights to Julia Ducournau’s “Alpha,” whom they previously collaborated with on the Palme d’Or winner, “Titane.”
