Interview: Director Eran Kolirin on Israel’s Oscar Submission "Let It Be Morning"

By Abe Friedtanzer

The winner of Israel’s Oscars, the Ophir Awards, automatically goes on to become the country’s Oscar submission for Best International Feature. This year, that film is Let It Be Morning, which made headlines at Cannes because its Palestinian cast refused to attend, objecting to it being labeled an Israeli film. Those who have seen the film will surely appreciate that this attitude is expected and and very much in the spirit of the film’s content. I had the chance to speak with the film's Israeli director, Eran Kolirin (pictured left) who is best known for writing and directing The Band’s Visit. His new film premieres this week in New York City at the Other Israel Film Festival… 

Click to read more ...

Seven new Oscar submissions, French finalists, and a potential Israel/Palestine conflict

by Nathaniel R

LET IT BE MORNING

The announcements of Oscar submissions from various countries are rolling in fast now. If you've missed previous posts we've already covered the submissions from Cambodia, Ecuador, Morocco, Poland, Serbia, Switzerland,  Albania, Ireland, Kyrgzstan, Slovenia, Ukraine, Armenia, Canada, Colombia, Peru, Germany, and Spain and have reviewed three of the films. In today's huge update we have finalists lists from Chile, France, and Sweden as well as official submissions from Greece, Hungary, The Netherlands, Somalia, South Korea, and Taiwan. But let's start with Israel as we foresee complications.

ISRAEL
Each year Israel's own Oscar style prize "The Ophir" is held around this time and whichever film wins becomes the automatic submission. They've only run into trouble with this system twice in the past (once for a film that had too much English and the other time with a tie so they had to vote again for Oscar purposes). But this year might be another. Let It Be Morning, with a largely Palestinian cast from source material by a Palestinian author, was the big winner at the Ophirs so it became the Israeli submission. While the director Erin Kolirin (of The Band's Visit fame) is Israeli, the film is about Palestinians and earlier this summer, the cast refused to attend the Cannes premiere because the festival labelled the film as an Israeli film. One imagines they'll object to this film representing Israel at the Oscars, for the same reason. Potentially complicating matters further is that Palestine also submits to the Oscars...

Click to read more ...

Ophir Nominations - which will become Israel's Oscar submission?

by Nathaniel R

Each year the winner of Best Picture at the Ophir Awards becomes the Israeli submission for the Oscar. If you've seen any of these pictures, do sound off. This year their nominees are...

Click to read more ...

Review: Israel’s Oscar Submission "Asia"

By Abe Friedtanzer

It's been quite the year for Shira Haas. Known previously to American audiences for her work in Shtisel on Netflix and the Jessica Chastain film The Zookeeper's Wife, she arrived in a big way in 2020 as the star of Unorthodox, which premiered on Netflix in March. Just a few weeks later, she was named Best International Actress at the Tribeca Film Festival, where her film Asia was slated to have its world premiere. After popping up at a number of festivals over the past few months and winning nine of its twelve Ophir (Israel’s Oscar) nominations, Asia is now opening the Israel Film Festival in Los Angeles, which begins today…

In her past few roles, Haas, who turned twenty-five in May, has been playing younger than her age. Esty in Unorthodox was nineteen, and in Esau, which debuted on digital and VOD a few weeks ago, she portrays a particularly young teenage love interest...

Click to read more ...

"Asia" Wins the Ophir. Let's Talk Israel and Oscar...

by Nathaniel R

Alena Yiv and Shira Haas as mother and daughter in ASIA

The Ophir Awards were held today in Israel with Asia emerging as the winner so it will now represent Israel at the Oscars. Based on buzz we've heard on this mother/daughter drama, which caused a stir at the Tribeca Film Festival earlier this year we've added it to the actual Oscar predictions and our letterboxd list tracking the contenders. Asia is a mother/daughter drama starring Alena Yiv as the mother and the brilliant Shira Haas (Unorthodox) as the daughter (they both won Ophir Awards for this) so we will see it the first chance we get. You can see a full list of the nominees and winners at this freshly updated post.

But let's talk about Israel at the Oscars. They hold the distinction of being (by far) the most nominated country that's never won. They used to be in a tight race for that frustrating honor but in the past seven years Poland won with Ida and then Mexico with Roma so now the title is theirs alone. Their nearest rival is a distant one (Belgium has 7 nominations). More on Israeli classics and Oscar stats after the jump...

ISRAEL'S OSCAR STATS
Submitting since 1964
52 Total Submissions 
10 Nominations (and 1 Additional Finalist)
0 Wins 

Click to read more ...