Took to past 6 pm Eastern/3 pm Pacific to get the shortlist but we do have the 15-film shortlist for the Best International Feature Film for the 93rd Academy Awards.
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Quo Vadis, Aida?
Chile, The Mole Agent
Czech Republic, Charlatan
Denmark, Another Round
France, Two of Us
Guatemala, La Llorona
Hong Kong, Better Days
Iran, Sun Children
Ivory Coast, Night of the Kings
Mexico, I’m No Longer Here
Norway, Hope
Romania, Collective
Russia, Dear Comrades!
Taiwan, A Sun
Tunisia, The Man Who Sold His Skin
Night of the Kings | La Nuit des rois by Philippe Lacote is technically a Canada co-production (Cote d’Ivoire/France/Canada/Senegal). The film played at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival.
Announcing the 93rd #Oscars shortlists! https://t.co/j8AtB09vsO
— The Academy (@TheAcademy) February 9, 2021
Canada's entry 14 Jours, 12 Nuits was not under serious consideration.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences extended the shortlist to 15 films from the original 10 films. The International Executive Committee usually makes some saves, adding in films to the shortlist. That did not happen this year.
Canada selects 14 Jours, 12 Nuits for the Best International Feature Film for the Oscars
TIFF selects Top 10 Canadian films of 2020
Funny Boy disqualified as Canada entry for Best International Feature Film at the Oscars
A follow up to our Funny Boy Canadian film review
Canadian film review: Funny Boy
Our Funny Boy preview with debuts soon on CBC and Netflix
Deepa Mehta's Funny Boy is Canada's Oscars selection
14 Jours, 12 Nuits from director Jean-Philippe Duval and writer Marie Vien became the backup option for Telefilm Canada. The organisation put most of its eggs in the basket of Funny Boy, a film that clearly wasn't eligible due to having too much English.
Telefilm Canada rolled the dice in a year where a breakthrough was possible. Figure that 93 films were accepted and 15 made the shortlist. That works out to 16.1% of the films making the shortlist and Canada was not in the conversation. Nadia, Butterfly might have made a slightly larger impact but none of those films were going to break through.
This is a highly unusual year in that your humble narrator hasn't seen a single film on the shortlist. Only seen 3 nominations this year: Palestine (Gaza mon amour); Greece (Apples); and Hungary (Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time).
Telefilm Canada's strategy for Funny Boy to push for the film in other categories isn't likely to succeed. Can't imagine Best Adapted Screenplay is an option given the number of issues within the script. We will find out on March 15 when the other Academy Awards categories are announced as well as the Best International Feature Film shortlist being reduced to 5.
2020 TIFF wrapup
2020 TIFF preview
2020 TIFF Canadian film preview
When TIFF concentrated on Canadian films for the opening night film
2020 TIFF Rising Stars
As a comparison, the Best Motion Picture – Foreign Language category at the Golden Globes has 3 films also nominated by those countries in the Oscars for Best International Feature Film: Another Round (Denmark); La Llorona (Guatemala); and Two of Us (France). The other films with Golden Globe nominations are The Life Ahead (Italy) and Minari (USA).
The Independent Spirit Awards have their nominees for Best International Film: Bacurau (Brazil); The Disciple (India); Night of the Kings (Ivory Coast); Preparations to Be Together For an Unknown Period of Time (Hungary); and Quo Vadis, Aida? (Bosnia and Herzegovina). The Brazil and India films are not the Oscars submission for those countries.
CanadianCrossing.com film coverage
The Best International Feature Film list will be reduced to 5 when all of the nominations are announced on March 15. The 93rd Academy Awards are set for April 25 on ABC and CTV.
photo credit: 14 Jours, 12 Nuits film
Twitter capture: @TheAcademy
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