Poland has submitted Pawel Pawlikowski’s Cannes award-winner Fatherland to represent the country in the best international feature Oscar category.
The film was chosen by the Polish Selection Committee. Poland previously won the international feature film Academy Award in 2015 with Pawlikowski’s Ida. The filmmaker was also selected for the category in 2018 with Cold War, which secured a nomination and saw the filmmaker also secure an Oscar nod for best director.
Starring Sandra Hüller and Hanns Zischler, Fatherland centres on the relationship between Nobel Prize-winning writer Thomas Mann and his daughter Erika. Set in 1949, at the height of the Cold War, the two embark on a road trip across a Germany in ruins. Returning home after 16 years of exile in the US, Mann faces both a divided country and a deep fracture within his own family.
Written by Pawlikowski and Henk Handloegten, the cast also includes August Diehl, Devid Striesow from four-time Oscar winner All Quiet On The Western Front, and Anna Madeley. Hüller was previously Oscar nominated in 2024 for best actress for Anatomy Of A Fall.
Producers are Mario Gianani, Lorenzo Mieli, Ewa Puszczyńska, Jeanne Tremsal, Edward Berger, Dimitri Rassam, and Lorenzo Gangarossa.
Fatherland received its world premiere in Competition at Cannes, where Pawlikowski won best director ex aequo with Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s La Bola Negra, which is Spain’s entry to the Oscars. It has also been selected for Telluride, New York Film Festival and the BFI London Film Festival, and is set to open theatrical in the US on October 23.
Alongside Ida’s win, Poland has secured 12 nominations in the international feature film category, the last time in 2023 with Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO.
The 99th Academy Awards are set to take place on March 14, 2027.
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