2025 Oscars: Best International Feature Predictions
Marcus Jones
Nominations voting is from January 8-12, 2025, with official Oscar nominations announced January 17, 2025. Final voting is February 11-18, 2025. And finally, the 97th Oscars telecast will be broadcast on Sunday, March 2 and air live on ABC at 7:00 p.m. ET/ 4:00 p.m. PT. We update our picks through awards season, so keep checking IndieWire for all our 2025 Oscar predictions.
The State of the Race
Now that submissions are closed for Best International Feature, the field of contenders has exploded, with more titles from different countries still to be announced.
While this is the case every year (think back to the whole debate over France snubbing “Anatomy of a Fall”), what has been striking about this year is that there seems to be the same buzz around titles that did not make the cut as there is about the films that are representing countries. For example, “No Other Land,” “April,” and “All We Imagine As Light,” which were speculated to be options to represent Palestine, Georgia, and India, respectively, are all having a bigger moment on the fall film festival circuit than the films actually submitted for Oscar consideration by those countries.
The only official Best International Feature submission that’s in a league of its own is Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez,” which in addition to winning the Jury Prize and Best Actress at Cannes, was the rare spring premiere to still be a runner-up for the People’s Choice Award at TIFF this September. At the rate it’s going, and with the backing of Netflix as its distributor, it seems near certain the operatic crime drama will not only make it into this category, but Best Picture itself.
Other early premieres that have been finding a second wind include “Dahomey,” winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlinale, now the second film from “Atlantics” director Mati Diop to be chosen as Senegal’s Oscar submission. “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” a Special Award winner at Cannes for Iranian dissident director Mohammad Rasoulof, has also found new momentum after being chosen as Germany’s submission. Canada’s entry “Universal Language” from director Matthew Rankin and Latvia’s entry “Flow” from director Gints Zilbalodis (also a Best Animated Feature contender) are two more examples of Cannes premieres that are making the rounds again.
Although it is not the first festival people think of in terms of generating films that belong in this particular category, Sundance still premiered plenty of titles now going on to represent countries like the Philippines (“And So It Begins”), Mexico (“Sujo”), and Switzerland (“Reinas”), though the biggest title to come from there may be “Kneecap,” Ireland’s submission that was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, a regular Oscar contender in this category.
Sony Pictures Classics also has “I’m Still Here,” Brazil’s submission that has been one of the biggest international titles to premiere in the fall, winning Best Screenplay at Venice. Italy’s submission “Vermiglio” from director Maura Delpero was also a big winner at that festival, receiving the Silver Lion Grand Jury Prize. Though Argentina’s entry “Kill the Jockey” premiered as another one of the competition titles at Venice, it did not receive any honors there. But the film did receive the Horizontes Award at the recent San Sebastián International Film Festival where Chile’s entry “In Her Place,” from 2024 Oscar nominee Maite Alberdi, had its world premiere.
Contenders for the shortlist of 15 are listed in alphabetical order below. No film will be deemed a frontrunner until we have seen it. Titles with an asterisk have not been submitted by a country as of yet. This list will be updated as official submissions are announced.
Frontrunners:
“Armand” (Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel, Norway)
“Dahomey” (Mati Diop, Senegal)
“Emilia Pérez” (Jacques Audiard, France)
“Flow” (Gints Zilbalodis, Latvia)
“I’m Still Here” (Walter Salles, Brazil)
“Kneecap” (Rich Peppiatt, Ireland)
“The Seed of the Sacred Fig” (Mohammad Rasoulof, Germany)
“Universal Language” (Matthew Rankin, Canada)
“Vermiglio” (Maura Delpero, Italy)
Contenders:
“Abang Adik” (Jin Ong, Malaysia)
“Aire: Just Breathe” (Leticia Tonos, Dominican Republic)
“Algiers” (Chakib Taleb-Bendiab, Algeria)
“The Antique” (Rusudan Glurjidze, Georgia)
“And So It Begins” (Ramona S. Diaz, Philippines)
“Arzé” (Mira Shaib, Lebanon)
“Baghdad Messi” (Sahim Omar Kalifa, Iraq)
“Bauryna Salu” (Askhat Kuchencherekov, Kazakhstan)
“Beautiful Evening, Beautiful Day” (Ivona Juka, Croatia)
“Behind the Mist” (Sebastián Cordero, Ecuador)
“Castillo” (Abigail Mallia, Malta)
“Children of Las Brisas” (Marianela Maldonado, Venezuela)
“Cloud” (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Japan)
“Come Closer” (Tom Nesher, Israel)
“The Devil’s Bath” (Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz, Austria)
“Drowning Dry” (Laurynas Bareiša, Lithuania)
“Everybody Loves Touda” (Nabil Ayouch, Morocco)
“Family Therapy” (Sonja Prosenc, Slovenia)
“Family Time” (Tia Kouvo, Finland)
“Flight 404” (Hani Khalifa, Egypt)
“From Ground Zero” (Various Directors, Palestine)
“The Girl With the Needle” (Magnus von Horn, Denmark)
“The Glassworker” (Usman Riaz, Pakistan)
“Grand Tour” (Miguel Gomes, Portugal)
“Heaven is Beneath Mother’s Feet” (Ruslan Akun, Kyrgyzstan)
“How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies” (Pat Boonnitipat, Thailand)
“The Hungarian Dressmaker” (Iveta Grófová, Slovakia)
“If Only I Could Hibernate” (Zoljargal Purevdash, Mongolia)
“In Her Place” (Maite Alberdi, Chile)
“In the Arms of the Tree” (Babak Lotfi Khajepasha, Iran)
“Julie Keeps Quiet” (Leonardo Van Dijl, Belgium)
“Kill the Jockey” (Luis Ortega, Argentina)
“Kismet” (Ngang Romanus, Cameroon)
“La Palisiada” (Philip Sotnychenko, Ukraine)
“La Suprema” (Felipe Holguin, Colombia)
“Laapataa Ladies” (Kiran Rao, India)
“The Last” (Sebastián Peña Escobar, Paraguay)
“The Last Journey” (Filip Hammar and Fredrik Wikingsson, Sweden)
“Life” (Zeki Demirkubuz, Turkey)
“Mai Martaba” (Prince Aboki, Nigeria)
“Meeting with Pol Pot” (Rithy Panh, Cambodia)
“Melody” (Behrouz Sebt Rasoul, Tajikistan)
“Memories of a Burning Body” (Antonella Sudasassi, Costa Rica)
“Memory Lane” (Jelle de Jonge, Netherlands)
“Murderess” (Eva Nathena, Greece)
“My Late Summer” (Danis Tanović, Bosnia and Herzegovina)
“Nawi” (Vallentine Chelluget, Apuu Mourine, Kevin Schmutzler, and Toby Schmutzler, Kenya)
“Old Fox” (Hsiao Ya-chuan, Taiwan)
“Old Righteous Blues” (Muneera Sallies, South Africa)
“Own Hand” (Gory Patiño, Bolivia)
“Peach Blossom, Pho and Piano” (Phi Tiến Sơn, Vietnam)
“Reinas” (Klaudia Reynicke, Switzerland)
“Rita” (Jayro Bustamante, Guatemala)
“Russian Consul” (Miroslav Lekić, Serbia)
“Santosh” (Sandhya Suri, United Kingdom)
“Saturn Return” (Isaki Lacuesta and Pol Rodríguez, Spain)
“Take My Breath” (Nada Mezni Hafaiedh, Tunisia)
“Semmelweis” (Lajos Koltai, Hungary)
“Shambhala” (Min Bahadur Bham, Nepal)
“Sujo” (Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez, Mexico)
“Supermarket” (Nemanja Bečanović, Montenegro)
“Take My Breath” (Nada Mezni Hafaiedh, Tunisia)
“Three Kilometres to the End of the World” (Emanuel Pârvu, Romania)
“Touch” (Baltasar Kormákur, Iceland)
“Triumph” (Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov, Bulgaria)
“Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In” (Soi Cheang, Hong Kong)
“Under the Volcano” (Damian Kocur, Poland)
“Wake Up Mom” (Arianne Benedetti, Panama)
“Waterdrop” (Robert Budina, Albania)
“Waves” (Jiří Mádl, Czech Republic)
“Women from Rote Island” (Jeremias Nyangoen, Indonesia)
“The Wrestler” (Iqbal Hossain Chowdhury, Bangladesh)
“Yana-Wara” (Óscar Catacora and Tito Catacora, Peru)
“Yasha and Leonid Brezhnev” (Edgar Baghdasaryan, Armenia)
“8 Views of Lake Biwa” (Marko Raat, Estonia)
“12.12: The Day” (Kim Sung-su, South Korea)
