Denmark names three Oscar finalists including "Flee"
Friday, September 17, 2021 at 3:00PM by Nathaniel R
As we've long noted for the rest of the online world that doesn't pay super close attention to this category even if they'll dutifully share press release, Denmark is currently Oscar's favourite country (statistically speaking). In the past 12 years they've been nominated six times, won twice, and also made the finals twice more without actually snagging the nomination. That's the best run of any country in quite a long while in this category. They're the defending champion since the brilliant boozy Another Round took the gold at the 93rd Oscars. It's rare for countries to win this category in consecutive years but Denmark could given their hot streak. They've actually done that once before (1987 & 1988 with Babette's Feast and Pelle the Conqueror). Here are their three finalists for submission this time around...
Flee by Jonas Poher Rasmussen
This animated memoir about a gay Afghan refugee about to marry a Danish man, keeps collecting obsessive fans. After its successful festival launches at Sundance and Gothenberg early in 2021 it played Denmark theaters in the summer. It would be a semi-unusual choice for submission, since it's an animated LGBTQ documentary, but probably a smart one. People really love the movie and theoretically, if NEON's campaign is smart and well-funded and lucky, Flee could hit the triple that no film has ever achieved: Documentary Feature, Animated Feature, International Feature. Or even a quadruple: those three plus Best Picture.
Margrete: Queen of the North by Charlotte Sieling
Denmark's Best Actress in Perpetuity, Trine Dyrholm, stars in a biopic about a 15th century Queen of Scandinavia. The Danish Film Institute usually chooses something contemporary from their options but they did have Oscar success with the excellent costume drama A Royal Affair (2012) a decade back. Margrete opened in Danish movie theaters yesterday.
Shadows in My Eyes by Ole Bornedal
This last finalist is a true World War II story about an airforce mission to bomb the Gestapo that goes awry resulting in tragedy. It's set to open in Denmark on October 28th.
Denmark will make their final decision on October 25th.
Reader Comments (4)
Flee is a film I'm really excited for. How cool would it be if it picked up 3 or 4 of the nominations Nate mentioned!
I have seen none of these yet, but I'd love them to select FLEE. I'm sure one of the international/animation/documentary branches would mess it up, but wouldn't that be wild if it got all three?
Flee sounds intriguing. I hadn't heard of it.
Denmark's current run is like Italy and France in the first 20 years of this award.
I'm so excited for your International Feature Film coverage - always the go-to place for the race.
One thing: Denmark's back-to-back wins were 1987 and 1988! You always use the correct Oscar dates (year of eligibility rather than year of ceremony), I was shocked by this rare slip-up! ☺
I saw Flee at Sundance... but although it is special, being a gay animated film, I didn't like the visual of the animation, at times kind of weirdly simplistic and it had weird bits of film edited into it, if I remember correctly, which made it even messier. The story was a simple refugee story, not particularly emotional (at least not to me), so it would be weird for it to become nominated in any of the categories, at least for my tastelevel... but I have not seen the other two...Those sound more interesting though. Would love to see any of Trine's films get a boost. And WW2 has been hot in this category, but I guess not lately though... The trailer of Shadows in my eyes with warplanes, Gestapo and warm family scenes - that sure looks like something that I would choose out of these 3.