‘Autobiography’ Director Makbul Mubarak Says Indonesia’s Oscar Entry Is “About Loyalty And Legacy” – Contenders International

Justice League” as well as Netflix’s new “Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire,” said he’d like to see the British superspy get a time-traveling makeover while the 60-year-old series reinvents itself.“It’d be cool to see, like, 20-year-old James Bond,” Snyder told the Atlantic. “The humble roots that he comes from. Whatever trauma of youth that makes you be able to be James Bond.

Taylor Swift has found her new home with the Kansas City Chiefs!

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Mark Francis, a veteran TV and streaming executive in Asia, has joined Indonesia’s Vidio streaming platform as its chief content officer and strategy officer. The appointment comes as the platform repasses 4 million subscribers and reclaims a lead in the Indonesian streaming market. Based in Jakarta and reporting directly to CEO Sutanto Harton, Francis is expected to oversee the freemium streamer’s content strategy and programming.

J. Kim Murphy Filmmaker Michael Goorjian set out to create a different kind of film about Armenian nationality when developing “Amerikatsi,” the country’s submission in the international feature category for this year’s Academy Awards. Along with directing, Goorjian also stars as Charlie, an American who repatriates to Armenia after World War II — but ends up in a Soviet prison for simply wearing a tie.

John Bleasdale Guest Contributor When writer-director Mohamed Kordofani first conceived of the film “Goodbye Julia,” he realized that he didn’t have a single friend from South Sudan — “and there are millions who live in Khartoum.” Now he has hundreds, he tells Variety. The first Sudanese film to premiere in the Un Certain Regard sidebar in Cannes, his debut feature won the Prix de la Liberté and is now the official Sudanese entry for the Academy Awards, with Lupita Nyong’o on board as an executive producer. The film had its Middle East and North Africa premiere this week at El Gouna Film Festival, where Kordofani was awarded the Variety MENA Region Talent Award.

The official German Oscar entry for Best International Feature is an insular, pulse-pounding thriller set within the confines of a school that, for cinematic purposes, doubles as a microcosm of society in general circa 2023 where facts don’t matter, misinformation is rampant, suspicions run hot, divisions run deep, racism still rears its ugly head, and no one can be quite sure where, and even if they want to, fit in.

Kelsey Parker has shared an emotional message about grief in the festive season, as she approaches her second Christmas without her late husband. Kelsey tragically lost her husband, The Wanted star Tom Parker, in 2022, two years after he had been diagnosed with a brain tumour. Since then the mum-of-two, 33, has been open about her heartbreak and feelings of grief, including how she has navigated becoming a single parent and a young widow.

Swiss writer-director Carmen Jaquier’s Swiss-language debut feature Thunder, is about adolescent sexual awakening set at the cusp of the 19th and 20th centuries. It’s the story of Elisabeth (Lilith Grasmug), a teenage novitiate who, as she’s about to take her vows, is told of her elder sister Innocente’s sudden death.

Omen is the official submission from Belgium for the International Feature Oscar category and comes from multi-hyphenate interdisciplinary artist Baloji, who makes his feature directing debut. The film had its world premiere in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section this year where it won the New Voice Prize, before going on to play myriad festivals. Utopia is the North American distributor. 

2018 Everyone Is a Hero writer-director Jude Anthany Joseph was a victim of the 2018 Kerala floods in southern India, a catastrophic natural disaster that was the worst flood to hit the region in more than a century.

Filmmaker Stephan Komandarev, whose credits include two previous Bulgarian Oscar entries including the shortlisted The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner, wrapped a movie trilogy about the social ills of post-communist society with Blaga’s Lessons, about the harrowing journey of a retired teacher through the dangerous world of phone scams.

Bosnian-Dutch director Ena Sendijarević’s satire Sweet Dreams unfolds on a plantation in the Dutch East Indies that is falling into decay in step with the crumbling of the Netherlands’ colonial power.

The husband-and-wife team behind 2019 feature animation Oscar nominee Loving Vincent, DK and Hugh Welchman, is back in the awards race this season with The Peasants.

Like the Japanese with their Godzilla movies, the Koreans are partial to a bit of post-apocalyptic social satire, and Um Tae-Hwa’s box office hit Concrete Utopia follows a path trailblazed in 2013 by Bong Joon-ho’s cult sci-fi Snowpiercer. Adapted from the popular webtoon Pleasant Outcast by Kim Soong Nyung and partly inspired by British writer J.G. Ballard’s 1975 novel High-Rise, it centers on a Korean apartment block whose residents become lawless after a terrifying earthquake rips through the country.

Ilker Çatak’s The Teachers’ Lounge world premiered to acclaim in the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama section in February, then swept the board three month later at the German Film Awards, scooping best film, director, screenplay, editing and actress for Leonie Benesch.

For Iranian-Australian filmmaker Noora Niasari, her debut feature Shayda has served as an authentic and honest exploration into her own personal childhood trauma. The film, which is being released by Sony Pictures Classics and won the World Cinema Dramatic Competition Audience Award in Sundance earlier this year, is Australia’s Oscar submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.

After stumbling upon a story through a link on Facebook about a team of blind footballers from Egypt who arrived in Warsaw and disappeared into thin air after it turned out they could actually see, writer-director

Society of the Snow, directed by Spanish filmmaker J.A. Bayona and Spain’s submission into the 2024 Oscar race, is based on the true story of the 1972 Andes flight disaster in which a flight carrying Uruguay’s Old Christians Club rugby team for a match in Santiago, Chile, crashed on a glacier at the Valle de las Lágrimas (Valley of Tears).

Director Denis Villeneuve has high hopes for Dune: Part Two, which is currently scheduled for release on March 1, 2024, after bouncing through several potential dates.

Murtada Elfadl Shot in dense, high-contrast black and white, writer-director C.J. “Fiery” Obasi’s “Mami Wata,” unspools like a mysterious dream. It’s both inscrutable and hypnotic, delivering indelible images while remaining narratively opaque.