FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM OSCAR RACE: 9 FILMS MOVE FORWARD

Check out the nine films which the Academy's Foreign Language Film committees have selected as the shortlist for nomination. As usual, there are some notable absences, such as Chile's Neruda and France's Elle. Happy to say that I called the inclusions of Land of Mine (possible winner) and Tanna (possible nominee), and delighted to note that My Life as a Courgette still stands a chance too! This is, however, a disappointingly Euro-centric list. Oscar nominations will be announced on the 24th of January.

It's Only the End of the World (Xavier Dolan) - Canada

The King's Choice (Erik Poppe) - Norway

Land of Mine (Martin Zandvliet) - Denmark

A Man Called Ove (Hannes Holm) - Sweden

My Life as a Courgette (Claude Barras) - Switzerland

Paradise (Andrey Konchalovskiy) - Russia

The Salesman (Asghar Farhadi) - Iran

Tanna (Martin Butler and Bentley Dean) - Australia

Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade) - Germany

JACKIE: TEASER TRAILER

Pablo Larrain's Jackie, his second critical hit of 2016 after Neruda, and his third such hit to receive a US theatrical release this year including The Club, is the Oscar juggernaut we never saw coming. Natalie Portman is a Best Actress frontrunner as Jackie Kennedy, and the film is being seriously considered for several other nominations. Its award pedigree is already strong - a competition world premiere at Venice yielded an official jury prize for screenwriter Noah Oppenheim, while its TIFF Platform entry resulted in it winning the top award for that section. Out on the 2nd of December in the US.

CINEMA NOVO WINS CANNES' SECOND EVER L'OEIL D'OR

L'Oeil d'Or, a new prize at Cannes that originated at last year's festival, has been handed out. The award goes to the best new documentary screening in any section of Cannes. This year's choice is Eryk Rocha's Cinema Novo, which was one of the few contemporary titles in Cannes Classics. It profiles the work of some of Latin America's most important an influential filmmakers, and thus marks the second time - out of two - that a film from South America has received this award. What a fantastic way to celebrate this often underrepresented region for filmmaking, in a year that has also attracted considerable acclaim for fellow South American titles Neruda and Aquarius. There was a Special Mention for the highly-praised The Cinema Travellers, also from Cannes Classics and also a film about the medium itself, from debut directors Shirley Abraham and Amit Madheshiya.

TRAILER FOR HELL OR HIGH WATER

Not even after a late inclusion into the official Un Certain Regard lineup at Cannes 2016 was I convinced of the quality of David MacKenzie's latest, the crime thriller Hell or High Water. But reviews are in, and they're unanimously positive, so my expectations have risen. And thus, as occurred last week when Pablo Larrain's Neruda was received with raves at Cannes, here's the trailer, which I hadn't initially appreciated. I still don't, alas, but I trust that the film itself is stronger than it appears to be here. Those reviews have certainly gone some way toward persuading me of that. Its first international release comes on the 12th of August in the US.

NERUDA - TRAILER FOR NEW PABLO LARRAIN FILM

I saw this trailer for Neruda yesterday. I thought it looked fine, and given that I've generally been cooler on Pablo Larrain's output than most, I chose not to publish it. But the raves for this so-called 'anti-biopic' out of Cannes have prompted me to reconsider, and so here it is, the trailer for one of the year's best-reviewed films thus far - so well-received that, even if I am yet again cooler on this Larrain than most others, I'm highly likely to enjoy. Though if my take on last year's Quinzaine darling My Golden Days is anything to go by, I'd do well not to get my hopes up.