Criterion to Release Joachim Trier’s SENTIMENTAL VALUE, Jafar Panahi’s IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT, and Kleber Mendonça Filho’s THE SECRET AGENT

This just in from Neon via press release:

NEON’S SLATE OF AWARD-WINNING FILMS TO JOIN THE CRITERION COLLECTION, INCLUDING  JOACHIM TRIER’S ‘SENTIMENTAL VALUE,’  JAFAR PANAHI’S ‘IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT,’ AND  KLEBER MENDONÇA FILHO’S ‘THE SECRET AGENT’

New York, NY (January 15, 2026) – NEON is excited to announce the addition of three of their award-winning films to the Criterion Collection. The titles include Joachim Trier’s SENTIMENTAL VALUE, Jafar Panahi’s IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT, and Kleber Mendonça Filho’s THE SECRET AGENT.

SENTIMENTAL VALUE, Joachim Trier’s Cannes Grand Prix winner, comes to Criterion following its impressive theatrical run, which delivered the highest post-pandemic opening-weekend per-screen average for a foreign-language film, grossing a total $200,000 across only four screens. The film was nominated for eight Golden Globes, winning Best Supporting Actor for Stellan Skarsgaard, with additional nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actress, and Best Supporting Actress twice. The film was additionally recognized with seven Critics Choice Award nominations; Best Supporting Actor for Stellan Skarsgård by The Los Angeles Film Critics Association; and Best Supporting Actress for Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas by the National Board of Review. It also boasts nine European Film Award nominations, the most of any this year, including Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Casting, and Best Production Design – among others. The film was shortlisted for Best International Feature and Best Casting at the 2026 Academy Awards. Most recently, the film was nominated for a Producers Guild Award. The film is currently in the theaters and available on demand.

IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT, from Jafar Panahi, won the Palme d’Or at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, marking NEON’s sixth consecutive Palme d’Or win. It was nominated for 4 Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Foreign Language Film. It also received a Special Award from The American Film Institute. Other nominations include 4 European Film Awards including Best Film, Director, Screenwriter, and the Lux Audience Award. It was named Best International Film by the National Board of Review. The film has won Best Director from the New York Film Critics Circle and Best Screenplay from both the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and the National Society of Film Critics. It also won 3 Gotham Awards including Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best International Film.  The film is shortlisted for Best International Film for the 2026 Academy Awards and is longlisted for Film Not In The English Language and Best Original Screenplay at the BAFTAs. The film is currently in theaters and available on demand.

Kleber Mendonça Filho’s THE SECRET AGENT starring Wagner Moura won Best Director, Best Actor, and the FIPRESCI International Critics Prize for Best Film at Cannes.  Since then it was nominated for 3 Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture – Drama and won 2 Golden Globes including Best Actor – Drama for Moura and Best Language Film. It is nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best International Film and was named one of the Top 5 International Films by the National Board of Review.  It also won the top 3 critics’ prizes for Best International Films – the New York Film Critics Circle, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and the National Society of Film Critics.  Following that, it won the Best International Feature from the Critics Choice Association and Wagner Moura won Best Actor from the New York Film Critics Circle. The film is shortlisted for Best International Feature and Best Casting at the 2026 Academy Awards and is longlisted for Film Not In The English Language and Best Original Screenplay at the BAFTAs. The film is currently in theaters.

Kicking off awards season this year, NEON received 21 Golden Globe nominations, the most of any motion picture studio this year, and garnered 3 major wins across THE SECRET AGENT and SENTIMENTAL VALUE, highlighting a significant moment for the company’s internationally driven slate. Five of NEON’s films have also been selected by their home countries as official selections for the Best International Feature Film category at the 98th Academy Awards.

Building on this momentum, NEON’s 2026 slate of upcoming releases include Ugo Bienvenu’s Arco, releasing January 23; Oliver Laxe’s Sirat, releasing February 6, Matt Johnson’s Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, releasing February 13; Baz Luhrmann’s EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert, releasing February 20; Steven Soderbergh’s The Christophers; and Boots Riley’s I Love Boosters, which is set to open SXSW this year; and more.

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About Criterion

Since 1984, the Criterion Collection has been dedicated to publishing important classic and contemporary films from around the world in editions that offer the highest technical quality and award-winning original supplements. No matter the medium—from laserdisc to 4K, Blu-ray and DVD to streaming on the Criterion Channel—Criterion has maintained its pioneering commitment to presenting each film as its maker would want it to be seen, in state-of-the-art restorations with special features designed to encourage repeated watching and to deepen the viewer’s appreciation of the art of film.

www.criterion.com | @criterioncollection

About NEON

In only nine years, NEON has garnered 39 Academy Award® nominations (7 last year), 11 total wins (5 last year), including two Best Picture wins, and has grossed over $400M at the box office. The company continues to push boundaries and take creative risks on bold cinema such as Sean Baker’s Anora, which recently took home five Academy Awards® including Best Picture, and was released in theaters to the highest per-screen average of 2024; as well as Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite, which made history winning four Academy Awards®, becoming the first non-English-language film to claim Best Picture, and grossed over $54M at the domestic box office.

NEON has built an impressive streak winning the coveted Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, with six consecutive wins, including this most recent year’s winner It Was Just an Accident from Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, as well as Anora, Parasite, Anatomy of a Fall, Titane, and Triangle of Sadness. In 2024, NEON was named The Hollywood Reporter’s Independent Studio of the Year and received the Clio Award for Studio of the Year.

As a burgeoning leader in the production space, NEON’s recent and upcoming in-house productions include: David Robert Mitchell’s They Follow starring Maika Monroe; the highly anticipated Boots Riley feature I Love Boosters starring Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, LaKeith Stanfield, Demi Moore, and Eiza González; The Wrong Girls starring Kristen Stewart and Alia Shawkat; Tilman Singer’s Cuckoo starring Hunter Schafer; and Brandon Cronenberg’s Infinity Pool. NEON’s international sales outfit handles the company’s in-house titles as well as third party projects.

NEON has amassed a library of over 120 films, with a noteworthy selection of Academy Award® nominated films including: Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig; Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days; Robot Dreams from Pablo Bergfeer; documentaries All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, Fire of Love, Moonage Daydream, and Flee, which made history becoming the first film to score an impressive trifecta of Oscar® nominations; Joachim Trier’s The Worst Person in The World; and Craig Gillespie’s I, Tonya.