Belgium's "Close", Venezuela's "The Box" and Israel's "Cinema Sabaya" join the Oscar race

With 43 entries thus far, we're just a few titles short of the halfway mark on submissions for Best International Feature Film at the 95th Oscars. There's usually a little over 90 films. You can see the full submission charts here but if that's too much all at once for you, here are the most recent three countries to announce....

🇦🇲 CLOSE (Lukas Dhont)
BELGIUM (7 nominations and 2 additional finalists from 47 submissions)

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7 new Oscar submissions for Best International Feature

We're now up to 40 submissions in the upcoming Oscar race for Best International Feature Film. You can see the full charts here but if that's too much all at once for you, here are the latest countries to announce from Armenia to Slovakia, some going with films that are currently playing at TIFF...

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France chooses 5 finalists for the coveted Oscar submission

by Nathaniel R

France is the most-nominated country of all time in the Best International Feature Film Oscar race. What's more their tally is so impressive it will be probably be several decades before anyone catches up (IF that ever happens). Though they don't lead in winners (Italy holds that distinction) they haven't ever had a true slump of being passed over for nominations* so they're always crucial to watch. Consider the crazy impressive stats. They are the only country to submit to each and every Oscar race in this category. Their total honors include 38 nominations, 9 wins, and 3 additional finalists from 67 submissions. Before this became a competitive category in 1956, they won 3 Honorary Awards.

What will they select this year? The Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée, the agency responsible for choosing France's submission has named five finalists, all but one of which are from female directors. Here's a little detail on each film (if the title is linked it goes to our festival coverage)...

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Finland submits "Girl Picture" (ihana!) and other Oscar news

by Nathaniel R

You all know that we here at TFE are huge fans of Girl Picture and today comes news that Finland has chosen it as their Oscar submission. While we wish its US release had been noisier (it was still playing in NYC last week) we've talked it up to everyone we know and all of you of course. It's one of the seven most recent official submissions to be announced. More after the jump... 

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5 more countries name their Oscar submissions

by Nathaniel R

Real life multi-lingual Portuguese twins play mute twins in Albania's entry

Chart update time yet again. We have five more entries for Best International Feature Film from Algeria, Hungary, Slovenia, Tunisia, and Ukraine. Only one of the submitted directors has been sent to the Oscars before so it's mostly young(ish) filmmakers in this block of contenders...

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