25-09-2018

FNE Oscar Watch 2019: Poland Selects Cold War as Oscar Candidate

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    Cold War by Paweł Pawlikowski Cold War by Paweł Pawlikowski photo by Łukasz Bąk

    WARSAW: Cold War directed by Paweł Pawlikowski has been selected as Poland’s official entry for the US Academy Awards in the Foreign Language Film category. The announcement comes just after the film's triumph at the 43rd Gdynia Film Festival.

    Cold War, starring Joanna Kulig and Tomasz Kot, is a drama about two people who can't live with or without each other. The film is set in the times of the Communism in the 50s and 60s in Poland. Pawel Pawlikowski has already won the Best Director Award in Cannes earlier this year.

    The Foreign Language Film category shortlist will be announced on 22 January 2019 and the 91st Academy Awards will be held on 24 February 2019.

    "It is a beautiful film, in my opinion, and it is a comprehensive work of film art with major international potential. It has already been very successful at European film festivals, it will be released in the USA and I hope that this makes it a strong candidate. An Academy award nomination and possibly the Oscar are absolutely within reach of the film that we've chosen" said the Director of the Polish Film Institute Radoslaw Śmigulski speaking to FNE just after the official announcement.

    Cold War is a Polish/French/British co-production from Opus Film, Apocalypso Film and MK Production. The co-producers are Arte France, Canal+ Polska, Kino Świat, EC1 Łódź - Miasto Kultury, the Mazovia Film Fund, the Silesia Film Fund and Podkarpacie Film Fund. The film got financial support from the Polish Film Institute,, MK2 Films, Film4, the British Film Institute and Eurimages.

    MK2 and Protagonist Pictures are co-repping the international sales for Cold War. They informed FNE that Cold War has been sold in several international territories including North America (USA, Canada), Europe (UK, France, Benelux, Germany, Italy, Greece, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Czech Republic, Scandinavia, Turkey), Asia (China, Japan, South Korea), Australia and New Zealand. Amazon is the US distributor for the picture and plans to premiere the film in December 2018 just in time for it to gain Oscar buzz.

    The film opened in Polish cinemas on 8 June 2018 distributed by Kino Świat and has had over 800,000 admissions to date.