The Minister of Culture gets involved. This Tuesday, May 19, 2026, while the anti-Bolloré forum shakes the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, Catherine Pégard broke the silence during the question session to the government. The latter regretted the “disproportionate” response from Maxime Saada, boss of Canal+, who declared that he no longer wanted to work with the signatories of an anti-Bolloré forum.
“I heard the emotion, the worry”
“I heard the emotion, the concern which is expressed in the cinema sector as it was expressed in the book sector recently (…) In this ambitious and fragile economy, Canal+ has had an important place by financing today almost one in two French films. It contributes to the diversity of our cinema that we must collectively ensure. The major place of this company in cinema gives it a voice that counts. I regret that the response, disproportionate, at the very least, given to the very real concerns that have been expressed, has heightened them.“, explained the minister in the hemicycle.
On May 11, the newspaper “Libération” published a speech by the collective “Zapper Bolloré”expressing alarm at the future control of the Breton billionaire’s group over the network of UGC cinemas. Canal+, which has already acquired 34% of the company’s capital, is aiming for 100% by 2028. A very worrying prospect for the collective, which had indicated that Vincent Bolloré would soon be “in a position to control the entire film production chain, from their financing to their distribution on small and large screens“. “[…] The billionaire does not hide the fact that he is leading a ‘civilizational project’, far-right reactionary, through his TV channels like CNews and his publishing houses. If the influence of this ideological offensive on the content of films has been discreet for the moment, we have no illusions: it will not last“, we could notably read in this text supported by 600 signatories, including Juliette Binoche, Swann Arlaud, Raymond Depardon, Adèle Haenel and even the screenwriter Arthur Harari.
Maxime Saada’s anger after the publication of the “Libération” column
From the Croisette, Maxime Saada, the chairman of the board of directors of the Canal+ group, whose reference shareholder is the Bolloré group, affirmed that this platform was a point of no return for its signatories, and that his group would no longer collaborate with them in the future. “I experienced this petition as an injustice towards the Canal teams who are committed to defending the independence of Canal+, in all the diversity of its choices, said the manager during the “producers’ brunch” of the Cannes Film Festival, according to comments reported by AFP. Consequently, I will no longer work, I no longer want Canal to work with the people who signed this petition. […] I don’t want to work with people who call me a crypto-fascist, I’m sorry, the limit, for me, is there.“The Canal+ group is to date the leading financier of French cinema, our colleagues remind us, despite a decreasing budget allocated to the sector (170 million by 2027, compared to 220 million previously).
“Can we still believe in the independence of Canal+ from the far-right billionaire, against whom it is now officially impossible to speak out?” deplored the Zapper Bolloré collective to AFP, following the reaction of Maxime Saada. Gaëtan Bruel, president of the National Center for Cinema and Animated Images (CNC), said:regretté“this Monday, May 18 on France Inter the reaction of the president of the board of directors of Canal+. “In terms of freedom of expression, this raises questions. Because the right to criticism is part of this fundamental principle, he said, before specifying: Canal is still the first private support of the greatest diversity of French cinema […] It is factually false to say that Canal would have given up on supporting all the diversity of cinema. I don’t find myself in the facts that [la tribune] denounces (…) and we must be careful of self-fulfilling prophecies“, he concluded.
