Best International Feature: Indonesia, Senegal, Thailand

by Cláudio Alves

Tomorrow we'll know which 15 films made the Academy's shortlist in the Best International Feature Film category. In this series of capsule review trios, I've looked at 27 films whose quality spanned from shoddy propaganda to caustic masterpiece. To end in a round number, I'd like to shine a light on three films that are very unlikely to be chosen by AMPAS. Three features whose singular oddness and inspiringly weird ideas deserve to be celebrated, even though one of them can be called faultless. Join me, as I try to describe the wonders of an Indonesian horror flick with historical ambitions, a Senegalese tragedy with Shakespearean proportions, and a Thai coming-of-age tale centered on the ideologies inherent to minimalist interior design…

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More International Contenders including a Student Academy Award Winner!

Since the last roundup the following countries have been added to the list of contenders for this year's Best International Feature Film race bringing our total to 77 contenders.

• Argentina -The Sleepwalkers
• Armenia - Songs of Solomon
• Bolivia - Chaco
• Egypt - When We're Born (a musical!) 
• Hungary - Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time (Hungary & Oscar)
• India - Jallikattu (streaming on Prime)
• Ireland - Arracht
• Italy - Notturno (Reviewed | Italy & Oscar) 
• Lebanon - Broken Keys (more on this one below)
• Philippines - Mindanao
• Thailand - Happy Old Year (streaming on Netflix)

You can follow the list as it grows at our Oscar charts or on our Letterboxd list.  

Jimmy Keyrouz. Photographed by Christophe Meireis.

One of fun trivia items about this new batch is that Jimmy Keyrouz, the 32 year old behind Lebanon's Broken Keys actually has Oscar history. He won a Student Academy Award for his short Nocturne in Black four years ago. That short didn't end up getting Oscar-nominated, but he made the finalist list. Now his first feature, about a pianist struggling to repair his piano in a town where terrorists have banned music, is submitted by his home country. How about that? Congratulations! 

If you want to watch the submissions, 12 of the 77 titles are streaming.

 India's Jallikattu is on Amazon Prime, Guatemala's La Llorona is on Amazon, Indonesia's Impetigore is on Shudder or Roku, Lithuania's Nova Lituania is on MUBI, South Korea's Man Standing Next is on Amazon, YouTube, or iTunes, and Chile's The Mole Agent on Hulu. Netflix has the other six currently available titles: Austria's What We Wanted, Mexico's I'm No Longer Here, Spain's The Endless Trench, Taiwan's A Sun, Turkey's Miracle in Cell No 7, and Thailand's Happy Old Year. 

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International Feature Film Oscar List... we're almost there!

Trine Dyrholm seduces her stepson in Denmark's submission "Queen of Hearts"

Countries have until October 1st to submit their representing film to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. Though there's one week left, we now have practically the whole list with 82 pictures announcing (see the charts and the letterboxd list) Last year the list was  87 pictures long and the record is 92 which was in 2017 so we'll probably see a slightly longer list when the Academy officially publishes it. Usually one or two films will mysteriously drop out or be replaced that were previously announced, too. So it's not official until it's official.

Do we talk about this category too much at TFE? Maybe so but we're into it. After the jump, 10 entries you can see early if you try and the 9 newest submissions.

The latest entries...

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"Incitement" will represent Israel at the Oscars while Thailand sends a horror film.

IncitementWe are now up to 73 films competing for those coveted 5 nominations in Best International Feature Film at the Oscars. Submissions are due to the Academy at the end of the month.  Israel's Ophir Awards were held over the weekend with Incitement taking Best Picture, making it their submission. The film tracks the year leading up to the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin from the point of the view of the assassin. Curiously the film only one two Ophir Awards, the other being Best Casting. The acting prizes largely went to Peaches and Cream and the craft prizes largely went to The Unorthodox but neither could muster up the support to take the top prize. The two Israeli pictures of 2019 with the arguably highest US profiles, festival hit Synonyms (at NYFF next) and currently in release Tel Aviv on Fire (nearing half a million at US arthouses) took Cinematography and Screenplay respectively. You can see all the winners here on the updated nominations post.

Other updates? Argentina is sending the pleasant heist comedy Heroic Losers starring their ubiquitous top film actor Ricardo Darín (The Secret in Their Eyes, Wild Tales) and his son Chino Darín (El Angel, A Twelve-Year Night), neither a stranger to headlining Oscar submissions. We saw that one at TIFF and it could make the finalist list if Oscar voters are in the mood for charming 'light' entertainment.

But the real curveball, and there's always one or two true oddities in the submission list, is Thailand's choice of the horror film Inhuman Kiss (starring Oabnithi Wiwattanawrang and Phantira Pipityakorn) which is about a girl whose head detaches from her body to hunt human flesh. Has there ever been a purer form of Oscar bait? Kidding but... wow. Want to see.