Discussion Why Are So Many Finished Films Still Unsold in 2026?

I think one of the biggest problems right now is that too many films are still being made as if it were 2018.

A lot of producers spend years financing and shooting a film, but almost no time thinking about who is actually going to buy it, how it will be marketed, or why audiences would even click on it today.

At Cannes, I also saw several completed films that were already 1–2 years old and still had not secured any meaningful deals. The reality is that by that point, many of those films have already lost a significant part of their value because buyers no longer see them as (new) titles.

Meanwhile, most buyers seem to be chasing the same thing: projects with clear positioning, recognizable elements, and something that can actually be marketed quickly and easily.

The painful truth is that today, just because a film is finished does not automatically mean it is sellable.

Maybe the real question is no longer whether too many films are being made, but how many projects are still being produced without any real market strategy hoping that a sales agent or a festival will somehow save the film later.