Academy Award Preview: International and Documentary features

 


The Academy Awards is just under a month away. In the run up I'm looking at the races in the competition. Today I'm looking at the field for International Features and Documentary Features.

International Feature:

* All Quiet on the Western Front
* Argentina, 1985
* Close
* EO
* The Quiet Girl

About: This is an interesting field. I've seen all five of the nominees and they all have their moments. If I was going on personal choice, I'd take Close, which is a screen story that hit hard emotionally. It's a beautifully told story as well, but sadly many of these films haven't gotten major wide releases in the United States. If you're looking at probability, All Quiet on the Western Front is a film that got a total of eight Academy Award nominations. That tally dwarfs the other films. All Quiet even got a Best Picture nomination. I think that gives it a huge edge.

The Prediction: All Quiet on the Western Front

Documentary Feature:

* A House Made of Splinters
* All That Breathes
* All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
* Fire of Love
* Navalny

About: Another interesting field. I've seen four of these films. A House Made of Splinters hasn't dropped here yet. That makes it something of a wild card contender. I enjoyed the other four that I saw and there are fans of all of them. Several of them have been nominated in the field with other awards, too. That adds an interesting wrinkle to the competition. In the end, my prediction is based on the one that seems to have gathered the most popularity over a year since it made a splash at the Sundance Film Festival in 2022.

The Prediction: Fire of Love

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