Cannes you hear me now?

The standing ovation is, by design, a rare event.

Except at the ongoing Cannes Film Festival, where it seems like every film premiere is followed by a standing O. And not only that – the length of each ovation becomes a central part of the film’s press at the festival.

So far, Martin Scorcese’s Flowers of the Killer Moon starring Leonardo DiCaprio tops the list of longest ovations at this year’s fest (which runs through May 27 in Cannes, France).

Tied for second longest at eight-minutes of standing and clapping are Firebrand, the Jude Law and Alicia Vikander drama, and May December, starring Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman.

Why all the applause? Simple — at Cannes, standing ovations are the rule, not the exception. Meaning: they happen, by design, at every premiere.

• As soon as a movie finishes, a camera begins filming live footage of the film’s stars and projects it onto the big screen for the entire crowd to see.
• This means the length is largely determined by the size of the film’s cast and how much each star hams it up for the camera (or, in Adam Driver’s case, lights a cigarette).

According to Vulture’s Nate Jones, the minimum length of applause for any film at Cannes is about four to five minutes. So if the audience hates a film, they will nonetheless rise from their seats and applaud for four minutes. (Now, if an applause goes seven minutes or longer? That might mean the crowd loved it.)

👏 Historic round of applause: This year’s clap-fests don’t come close to the festival’s longest ever standing ovation — 22 entire minutes. That honor goes to Pan’s Labyrinth, which went on to win three Oscars.