Entries for the 2026 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each title on this page.
The 98th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 15, 2026 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.
An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.
Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between October 1, 2024, and September 30, 2025. The deadline for submissions to the Academy is October 1, 2025.
A shortlist of 15 finalists is scheduled to be announced on December 16, 2025, with the final five nominees announced on January 22, 2026.
The 2024 awards saw 89 submissions with the five nominated films comprising Denmark’s The Girl With The Needle, France’s Emilia Perez, Germany’s The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, Latvia’s Flow and the eventual winner I’m Still Here from Brazil.
Latest submissions
Thailand: A Useful Ghost (Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke)
This supernatural drama won the Grand Prix in the Critics’ Week sidebar at Cannes after becoming the first Thai film selected on the Croisette in 10 years. Local superstar Davika Hoorne from box-office hit Pee Mak plays a dead woman who returns to her husband by possessing a vacuum cleaner and offers to be a useful ghost and get rid of useless spirits. The debut feature is produced by Cattleya Paosrijaroen and Soros Sukhum of Thailand’s 185 Films, alongside France’s Haut Les Mains, Singapore’s Momo Film and Germany’s Mayana Film. It marks the country’s 32nd submission to the Oscars with no nominations to date. However, it did make the shortlist last year with Pat Boonnitipat’s How To Make Millions Before Grandma Dies. International sales: Best Friend Forever
Bulgaria: Tarika (Milko Lazarov)
Tarika premiered at the BFI London Film Festival, and follows a girl (Veseka Valcheva) with medical condition that may give her supernatural abilities. She lives peacefully with her father (Zahari Baharov) until people in her village start blaming her for the deaths of livestock. It is Lazarov’s third feature. No Bulgarian films has been nominated in the category, although Stephan Komandarev’s The World Is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner was shortlisted in 2009. International sales: Films Boutique
Ireland: Sanatorium (Gar O’Rourke)
The Irish Film & Television Academy (IFTA) has selected Ireland produced, Ukrainian-language documentary Sanatorium, directed by Galway-born filmmaker Gar O’Rourke. The doc premiered at CPH:DOX and won best Irish documentary at the Galway Film Fleadh. It is set in southern Ukraine, where despite a war close by, mud treatments and electro-therapies continue at Kuyalnik Sanatorium, where the staff and visitors are determined to have a holiday away from the outside world. Producers are Venom Films’ Ken Wardrop and Andrew Freedman, along with Samantha Corr, and co-produced by 2332 Films Ukraine with backing from Screen Ireland, BBC Storyville, MetFilm Sales, France TV, and Creative Europe. The film was selected by a committee including filmmakers Kirsten Sheridan and Rich Peppiatt - director of last year’s Irish entry Kneecap which made it to the shortlist stage - plus actor Barry Ward. International sales: MetFilm Sales
Palestine: Palestine 36 (Annemarie Jacir)
Read the full story here.
Switzerland: Late Shift (Petra Volpe)
Read the full story here.
Czech Republic: I’m Not Everything I Want To Be (Klára Tasovská)
Premiering out of Berlinale’s Panorama strand in 2024, this documentary follows the life and career of photographer Libuše Jarcovjáková who captured LGBTQ life in Prague before homosexuality was decriminalised. The film is produced by Lukáš Kokeš and Tasovská herself for Somatic Films (Czech Republic), in co-production with Jakub Viktorín for Nutprodukcia (Slovakia) and Ralph Wieser for Mischief Films (Austria). The Czech Republic won the Oscar once in 1996 for Kolya while the country has been nominated a further two times and made it to the shortlist three times, most recently last year with Waves. International sales: Square Eyes
Turkey: One Of The Days When Hemme Dies (Murat Fıratoğlu)
This debut feature premiered at Venice Film Festival’s Horizons strand in 2024 where it won the special jury prize. One Of The Days… follows a tomato harvest worker who, desperately trying to pay off an impending debt, seeks a radical solution. Firatoglu also starred in and produced the film which he funded with debts and loans from family and friends. Turkey has submitted to the Oscars over 30 times and was shortlisted in 2008 for Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s Three Monkeys. International sales: Luxbox
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