Russia has selected Kira Kovlaneko’s Unclenching the Fists as its Official Submission for Best International Feature Film for the 94th Academy Awards. Unclenching the Fists had its World Premiere at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Grand Prize in Un Certain Regard.
Netflix released the official trailer for Prayers for the Stolen (Noche de fuego), the award-winning Mexican drama film on three young girls who take over the houses of those who have fled, dress up as women when no one is watching, and have a hiding place. The film was recently selected as Mexico’s official entry for Best International Feature Film at the 94th Academy Awards.
IFC Films will release Official Competition (Competencia oficial), the Spanish comedy film starring Penélope Cruz and Antonio Banderas alongside Oscar Martínez and José Luis Gómez. Directed by Mariano Cohn, the film had its world premiere at the 2021 Venice Film Festival in competition, where it earned glowing reviews. IFC Films will release the film in 2022.
The Romanian drama Uppercase Print by Radu Jude – winner of the 2021 Golden Bear for Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn – will open at the Metrograph in NYC on November 10, and at Laemmle Royal in LA on November 19. The film tells the true story of high school student Mugur Călinescu who was arrested in the early 1980s by Romania’s secret police agency for graffiti criticizing the regime of communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. Radu Jude also directed critically acclaimed Aferim! and “I Do Not Care If We Go Down In History As Barbarians.”
Kurosawa Kiyoshi’s wartime period drama Wife of a Spy (Japan) was the biggest winner of the night at the 15th Asian Film Awards (AFA15) taking the Best Film Award, the Best Actress Award (Aoi Yu) and the Best Costume Design Award (Koketsu Haruki).
The Asian Film Awards Academy (AFA Academy) announced that Demon Slayer -Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Movie: Mugen Train will receive the AFA Academy’s 2020 Highest-Grossing Asian Film Award.
Here is the official trailer for What Do We See When We Look at the Sky?, the Georgian romance drama having its North American premiere this weekend at the 59th New York Film Festival. The film, directed by Alexandre Koberidze, received its World Premiere at the 2021 Berlinale, where it won the FIPRESCI prize. What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? opens theatrically in NY on November 12 at Film at Lincoln Center and Metrograph, and will expand nationwide.
Magnolia Pictures released the official trailer for the Romanian drama Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, winner of the Golden Bear – 2021 Berlin International Film Festival. Directed by Radu Jude and starring Katia Pascariu, Claudia Ieremia, Olimpia Malai, along with Nicodim Ungureanu, the film opens in theaters on November 19th, 2021.
Its Friday, September 24, and opening in theaters are independent films I’m Your Man; Surge; Apache Junction; the Russian language drama Chernobyl 1986 along with the documentary films Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness and Man in the Field: The Life and Art of Jim Denevan.
La casa de Mama Icha (The House of Mama Icha), the debut feature documentary from Colombian director and cinematographer Óscar Molina will debut as part of POV’s 34th season on Monday, October 18, 2021.
The European Film Academy announced the second and final part of this year’s Feature Film Selection.
NEON released the official teaser trailer for The Worst Person in The World, the Norwegian dark comedy-drama film directed by Joachim Trier. The film, the finale in Joachim Trier’s Oslo Trilogy, after Reprise and Oslo, 31 August, stars Renate Reinsve as a 30-year-old woman in the midst of an existential crisis as she navigates between career and romantic choices.