Antonin Baudry’s political biopic De Gaulle and Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Cannes competition drama Minotaur are among the five titles that have been shortlisted to represent France in the Best International Oscar race at the 99th Academy Awards.
Announced this afternoon by the CNC, France’s national film board, the full shortlist includes De Gaulle and Minotaur alongside Louis Clichy’s Le Corset, Marine Atlan’s La Gradiva, and L’Inconnue by Arthur Harari.
More than five years in the making, Baudry’s De Gaulle revisits decisive episodes of World War II through the eyes of General Charles de Gaulle and the men and women who refused to surrender as the French nation fell apart. Simon Abkarian plays de Gaulle and is joined by an ensemble that includes Benoît Magimel, Mathieu Kassovitz, Niels Schneider and Karim Leklou, Florian Lesieur and Anamaria Vartolomei.
Zvyagintsev’s Minotaur won the Grand Prix at Cannes and was also included in Germany’s longlist for International Oscar submissions. The title follows a high-powered Russian executive whose meticulously controlled existence unravels when professional crises, global chaos, and marital betrayal converge. The film is a French-German-Latvian co-production.
Clichy’s Le Corset is an animated drama and won the Special Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard competition this year at Cannes. A coming-of-age tale, the story follows 11-year-old Christophe, who tries to live up to his rigid and distant father on their family farm.
Atlan’s La Gradiva won the main prize at this year’s Cannes Critics’ Week competition. The film follows a group of high school students on a class trip to Naples amid the charged landscape of Pompeii. In the shadow of these ancient ruins, they are suddenly overcome by a dizzying sensation, and one after another become engulfed by desire, anger, and despair until they surrender to it completely.
La Gradiva is Atlan’s first feature film, following work as a cinematographer on films including Jessica Forever, The Rapture, Summer Scars and Queens of Drama.
Harari’s L’Inconnue also debuted at Cannes. The film stars Léa Seydoux and Niels Schneider. Adapted from his graphic novel The Case of David Zimmerman, co-written with his brother Lucas Harari, The Unknown revolves around the titular David (Schneider), a reclusive photographer who wakes up on New Year’s Day to find himself in the body of a woman (Seydoux) with whom he had a strange encounter at a party the previous night.
The French selection committee will finalize its submission following a consultation period set to begin on September 16.
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