Oscars 2021: “Two”, which represents France, is part of the preselection

Of them, the film chosen by France to represent it in the race for the Oscars, is part of the preselection unveiled, Tuesday, February 9, by the Academy and will notably face Mads Mikkelsen in Drunk for Denmark.

This year, the Academy of Sciences and Cinema Arts, which awards the prestigious cinematographic awards, has chosen to include not ten but fifteen feature films in its preselection for the Oscar for “best foreign film”. Only five films will ultimately be retained in the list of nominations published on March 15.

Of them, by Italian director Filippo Meneghetti, tells the story of two retirees, Nina (Barbara Sukowa) and Madeleine (Martine Chevallier), who have lived a love story as secret as it is passionate for decades. They are next door in a small French town where everyone, including Madeleine’s daughter played by Léa Drucker, ignores their romance which will face unforeseen difficulties.

Provocative, bitter and funny feature film

Another serious competitor in this category, the Danish film Drunk starring Mads Mikkelsen, known to the general public for playing James Bond’s nemesis in Casino Royale (2006). In this provocative, bitter and funny alcoholic feature film by Thomas Vinterberg, Mikkelsen plays a teacher who goes through all stages of drunkenness with flying colors in a supposedly scientific experiment with three friends.

Of them and Drunk will compete alongside the Ivorian film The Night of the Kings, fable set in the sinister Maca prison in Abidjan, and I am no longer there, a Netflix production defending Mexican cinema and featuring a bunch of teenage cumbia music fans.

Last year, the Oscar for “best foreign film” went to South Korea with Parasite which also won the supreme award for “best film”, a historic double. The country is absent this time from the preselection, where Southeast Asia is represented by Taiwan (To Sun) and Hong Kong (Better days).

Guatemala, which presents La Llorona, a modern reinterpretation of the terrifying creature of Latin American folklore with, as a backdrop, the massacre of the Mayan Indians by the country’s military, hopes to accede to the nominations for the first time in its history, just like Romania and Tunisia which have passed the stage of preselection.

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chile, the Czech Republic, Iran, Norway and Russia were also selected at this stage.

The Oscars ceremony, postponed due to the pandemic, will be held on April 25.