The nominees for the Best film not in the English language at BAFTA 2018 was announced today. The five nominees are, Elle, First They Killed My Father, The Handmaiden, Loveless and The Salesman.
Elle is a psychological thriller film directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by David Birke, based on the novel Oh… by Philippe Djian. Djian’s novel was released in 2012 and received the Prix Interallié (National Literary Award).[4] The film stars Isabelle Huppert as a businesswoman who is raped in her home by a masked assailant and decides not to report it due to her past experience with police.
First They Killed My Father (Khmer: មុនដំបូងខ្មែរក្រហមសម្លាប់ប៉ារបស់ខ្ញុំ Moun dambaung Khmer Krahm samleab ba robsa khnhom) is a 2017 biographical historical thriller film directed by Angelina Jolie and written by Jolie and Loung Ung, based on Ung’s memoir of the same name. Set in 1975, the film depicts 7-year-old Ung who is forced to be trained as a child soldier while her siblings are sent to labor camps during the Socialist Khmer Rouge regime.
The film screened at the Telluride Film Festival and 2017 Toronto International Film Festival, and was released worldwide on Netflix on September 15, 2017 to positive critical reception.
The Handmaiden (Hangul: 아가씨; RR: Agassi; lit. ”Lady”) is a 2016 South Korean erotic psychological thriller film directed by Park Chan-wook and starring Kim Min-hee, Kim Tae-ri, Ha Jung-woo and Cho Jin-woong.It is inspired from the novel Fingersmith by Welsh writer Sarah Waters, with the setting changed from Victorian era Britain to Korea under Japanese colonial rule.
The film was selected to compete for the Palme d’Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. It was released in South Korea on 1 June 2016, to critical acclaim. It grossed over $37 million worldwide
Loveless (Russian: Нелюбовь) is a 2017 Russian drama film directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev. The story concerns two separated parents living apart whose affections are long forgotten and whose relationship has become loveless. They are temporarily brought together after their only young child becomes a missing person and they attempt to find him.
The film was shot in Moscow, with international support after the Russian government disapproved of Zvyagintsev’s 2014 film Leviathan. Loveless opened to critical acclaim and it won the Jury Prize at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival.
The Salesman (Persian: فروشنده, translit. Forušande, released in France as Le Client) is a 2016 drama film written and directed by Asghar Farhadi and starring Taraneh Alidoosti and Shahab Hosseini. It is about a married couple who perform Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman on stage, when the wife is assaulted. Her husband attempts to determine the identity of the attacker, while she struggles to cope with post-trauma stress. Farhadi chose Miller’s play as his story within a story based on shared themes. A co-production between Iran and France, the film was shot in Tehran, beginning in 2015.
The film premiered in competition in the 2016 Cannes Film Festival, where it won two awards—Best Screenplay for Farhadi and Best Actor for Hosseini. The Salesman went on to receive more positive reviews, and won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. However, Farhadi did not attend the 89th Academy Awards ceremony in protest of the U.S. Executive Order 13769.