The shortlist of 15 titles for the international feature film category will be announced on Dec. 21, with 92 titles vying for a starring spot ahead of the Oscar voting period that begins Jan. 12. In the past five years, four countries have earned three entries on the shortlist: Denmark, Germany, Mexico and Russia. If those countries’ success with the Academy is any indication of this year’s shortlist, voters may have a chance to pay tribute to Denmark. Holy spiderGermany No news from the Western Front and that of Mexico Bardo, false chronicle of a handful of truths. (The Russian Film Academy announced on September 26 that it would not submit a film for consideration.)
Other big contenders this season are those of Austria Corsage (who won actress Vicky Krieps the Un Certain Regard award for Best Performance at Cannes), Belgium Close to (winner of the Cannes Grand Prix and selected by the National Board of Review for the best international film), Cambodia Return to Seoul (selected best film by the Boston Society of Film Critics), France Saint Omer (winner of the Venice Film Festival Silver Lion), Pakistan Joyland (winner of the Un Certain Regard jury prize at Cannes), Poland EO (named best international film by the New York Film Critics Circle) and that of South Korea Decide to leave (which won Park Chan-wook the Best Director award at Cannes).
Despite earning a Golden Globe nomination for Best Picture Foreign Language on Dec. 12, don’t expect to see SS Rajamouli’s historical action epic. RRR on the international feature shortlist. India’s official Oscar entry is director Pan Nalin’s coming-of-age film Last movie show, about a young boy who wants to be a filmmaker. But that does not prevent RRR from an Oscar contender in other categories, especially for the original song heard in the wildly popular dance-battle sequence, “Naatu Naatu.”
This story first appeared in the December 16 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.