Our weekly Foreign Language Oscar race analysis pieces continue after a short hiatus. This week, we take a look at a region that rarely gets represented in the FLF race: the Middle East and Africa. Even though this region is usually a no-show in this category, things have been slightly improving in the past few years. Just last year we …

With SHOPLIFTERS, Hirokazu Kore-eda has created one of, if not the most, significant film of his career. What sounded like a social critique turned out to be one of the most engrossing, touching and urgent films of the year. With a quiet but powerful tone, Kore-eda takes viewers on a magical journey into the life of one peculiar family whose …

Our weekly Foreign Language Oscar race analysis pieces continue this week with a special look at the Asian films in this year’s race. Asian films have long been ignored in this category. Despite the strong film industry in each of China, Japan and South Korea, very few Asian films have made it to the final five (or even shortlist) in …

Our weekly Foreign Language Film Oscar race analysis pieces are back! For the next eight weeks, we will be taking a close look at this exceptionally competitive race and the multiple contenders trying to take a spot on the FLF shortlist which will be announced on December 17th. For the first 4 weeks, we will be analyzing the top contenders …

Nadine Labaki With CAPERNAUM, Nadine Labaki has captured the hearts of audiences across the globe. From Cannes (where the film nabbed the Jury Prize) to Sarajevo and Melbourne (both of which awarded the film their Audience Prize), the film is clearly resonating with audiences and will be one of the biggest Foreign Language Oscar contenders of the year. At TIFF, …

SHOPLIFTERS is Hirokazu Kore-eda’s best film to date, and one of the most pleasant surprises of the Cannes Film Festival. A deceptively simple but utterly profound film, it starts and ends on two completely different notes, making it a film that constantly surprises you with its unpredictable yet compelling narrative. A family of shoplifters is trying to get by, with …

Gaya Jiji’s directorial debut MY FAVORITE FABRIC is an undercooked, lacking melodrama that takes points for being one of the rare Arab films not to shy away from nudity in service of a story about sexual repression and hidden desires. Nahla (Manal Issa) lives with her sisters and mother in an apartment in Damascus. It is 2011 and the Syrian …

One of the most commercial and straightforward films of his career, Jia Zhang-ke’s ASH IS PUREST WHITE is accessible but not superficial, entertaining but never meandering or pandering to the audience. A deceptively simple love story, this is a smart reflection on gender relationships as a metaphor for the changing face of China. Qiao (Zhao Tao) and Bin (Liao Fan) …

Survival films can go either way: they can be engaging viewing experiences that expand their scope beyond their basic premise or can be slogs that never rise above the level of average survival stories. ARCTIC falls somewhere in between: it doesn’t fully engage compared to better survival films but doesn’t fall completely flat either. But watching the film, we couldn’t …

Pawel Pawlikowski’s COLD WAR is one of those films that you can respect but not outright love. Beautifully made but far more slight and bleaker than expected, the film features a fantastic central performance and a narrative that may appeal to European crowds and arthouse film lovers who fall for bleak films such as this one. The story is quite …