Canal+ boss Maxime Saada has sought to clarify his controversial comments about the signatories of a petition criticizing director Vincent Bolloré’s growing influence over French media, defending Canal+’s role as one of the French film industry’s biggest financiers, insisting there is “no question whatsoever that we will corner[them]”.
Speaking at Canal+’s general meeting on Wednesday, Saada said his remarks at the Cannes Film Festival had been distorted and pushed back against reports suggesting the company was creating a blacklist. This was Canal+ Group’s second general meeting since its listing on the London Stock Exchange under an independent banner and its separation from its former parent company Vivendi.
The controversy erupted after around 600 film experts, including Juliette Binoche and Arthur Harari, signed a petition expressing concern over Canal+’s acquisition of a 34% stake in UGC, a major French exhibition chain, which could take full control by 2028. It also highlighted the widespread concentration of media power tied to Bolloré’s empire and the rightward shift in editorial across the media in the run-up to the 2027 French presidential election. Adding to concerns about Bollore’s ideological agenda is the presence of CNews, France’s equivalent of Fox News, within Canal+ Group. At the Cannes screening, the banner was met with boos and whistles every time the Canal+ logo appeared on screen.
The backlash intensified after Saada said at the Cannes conference that Canal+ would no longer work with signatories of the petition, prompting accusations of blacklisting and threats of legal action from some syndicates (La The Human Rights League and CGT Spectacle). Following Saada’s comments, the petition swelled to more than 3,500 signatures and attracted international support from Javier Bardem, Mark Ruffalo and Ken Loach, among others.
Speaking before Canal+ Group shareholders today, Saada sought to minimize the scale of the conflict, pointing out that the French film industry employs around 250,000 people and claiming that only “1-2%” had signed the petition. “About 99% were unaware that they were joining a petition attacking Canal+,” Saada said.
Earlier this week, Cyril Bollore, who succeeded his father Vincent at the helm of the Bollore Group in 2019, also denied accusations that the family was pursuing political objectives and dismissed as a “big lie” claims that the group was promoting a “neo-fascist” project.
Against that backdrop, Saada used Canal+’s annual general meeting to defend both the broadcaster’s reputation and its long-standing role as a strong patron of French cinema, while making clear that attacks against the company would not go unnoticed.
“We experienced this as a grave injustice,” Saada said. “I’ve never talked about the blacklist.”
“There is no question at all that we would go after the engineers who signed the petition and deny funding to the films they worked on. It’s irrational. We have a basic conscience. We’re not going to target people who depend on their work for a living. That has never been an issue, and it will never be an issue.”
Still, Saada acknowledged that the relationship between filmmakers and Canal+ will be factored into the company’s decision-making process.
“I want to be transparent. It adds a new dimension to how projects are evaluated,” Saada said. “The question is, what kind of care do the people behind the project have for Canal+? Have they ever actively harmed Canal+?”
“If someone were to call you a fascist and knock on your door and ask for money, you might choose not to give it,” he continued. “Apply the same logic.”
The executive framed the controversy as an attack on Canal+ itself, not Bolloré. Mr. Bollore’s family group remains the reference shareholder with 30.4% of Canal+’s shares. Mr. Bollore will officially retire in 2022, but while it is well known that Mr. Bolloré, now 74, occasionally sits on Canal+ Group’s green light committee, his influence over decisions has remained largely unproven, with the exception of the infamous case of director François Ozon’s “By the Grace of God”, which was not acquired by the channel.
“When the words ‘fascist vision of the collective imagination’ are placed next to Canal+’s name, it is the Canal+ team, and my own integrity and reputation, that are attacked,” Saada said.
Mr. Saada also strongly defended Canal+’s track record in financing French films, arguing that the company has played a key role in sustaining the industry over the past 20 years.
“In the 10 years that I have been directly in charge, we have supported about 100 films a year. In total, about 1,000 films, at least half of which would not have been made without Canal+,” Saada said.
“Our contractual obligations are approximately 100 million euros per year, but we have voluntarily committed 160 million euros per year. This is not a question of obligation. It is a deliberate choice by Canal+ to support French and European cinema. We will continue to do so in all our diversity,” he continued, citing films such as Boris Rozkine’s The Suleimane Story, about a Guinean motorbike courier seeking asylum in Paris, and Dominique Mol’s The Case, about France’s yellow vest protests. 137″. Under the latest three-year agreement, Canal+ has committed to investing €480 million over three years until the end of 2027. Further negotiations for a new agreement between producers and Canal+ are believed to have already begun and could be affected by the ongoing dispute.
In addition to addressing the controversy, Saada also used the shareholders’ meeting to outline Canal+’s broader international expansion and content strategy, including the announcement that StudioCanal and Working Title have secured the rights to adapt the new novel “The Divorce” by bestselling author Frieda McFadden, whose “The Housemaid” was a global hit. He also teased plans that include a remake of The Italian Job, series adaptations of Army of Darkness, Le Cercle Rouge and Non-Stop, and a new live-action film Asterix directed by Jonathan Cohen and produced by Hugo Serignac’s Si Fu Mi Productions.
Saada also detailed Canal+’s plans following its acquisition of African pay-TV giant MultiChoice, unveiling an aggressive growth strategy aimed at reducing equipment costs, expanding the company’s distribution network, hiring an additional 1,000 sales staff across the continent, and increasing investment in African storytelling. The company is behind two African films that won awards at the Cannes Film Festival: Marie-Clémentine Dessabé-Jumbo’s Benimana, which became the first African film to win the Camera d’Or, and Rafiki Faryala’s Congo Boy, which won the acting award for Bradley Fiomona’s Un Certain Regard.
