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OSCARS 2015 Denmark

Three Danish features eyeing the Oscar nomination

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- The DFI has shortlisted Niels Arden Oplev’s Speed Walking, Pernille Fischer Christensen’s Someone You Love and Nils Malmros’ Sorrow and Joy

Three Danish features eyeing the Oscar nomination
Speed Walking by Niels Arden Oplev

Over the last four years, Danish titles have been predominant in the race for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. 

Danish director Susanne Bier’s In a Better World [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
won the award in 2011, racking up a third win for the country, after Gabriel Axel’s Babette’s Feast in 1987 and Bille August’s Pelle the Conqueror in 1988.

Ole Christian Madsen’s SuperClásico [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
was on the shortlist for the nominations for the 2012 Oscars, while Nikolaj Arcel’s A Royal Affair [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Mikkel Boe Følsgaard
interview: Nikolaj Arcel
film profile
]
and Thomas Vinterberg’s The Hunt [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
film profile
]
were nominated for the 2013 and 2014 editions, respectively.

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Now, the Danish Film Institute has named the three Danish candidates for its official Oscar submission, which will be announced on 18 September: Niels Arden Oplev’s Speed Walking, Pernille Fischer Christensen’s Someone You Love [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
and Nils MalmrosSorrow and Joy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
.

After his Swedish Millennium Trilogy movie, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Niels Arden Oplev
interview: Søren Stærmose
film profile
]
, and two US films, Arden Oplev has returned to his home turf for the portrayal of a young man who struggles to find his footing on the shaky ground of adolescence. His mother’s sudden death triggers a chain of events that affects everyone in the small community. Pilou Asbæk, Sidse Babett Knudsen and Villads Bøye play the leads in the film, which will open on 28 August.

Selected for the 2014 Berlinale, Someone You Love is the story of Thomas Jacob, a world-famous singer-songwriter based in Los Angeles, who travels back to Denmark to record a new album with his regular producer. His grown-up daughter then shows up with her own 11-year-old daughter, Noa. Starring Swedish actor Mikael Persbrandt and Danish actress Trine Dyrholm, Christensen’s fourth feature sold 166,000 tickets in Denmark. 

Launched as an official entry at last year’s Rome International Film Festival (8-17 November), and starring Jacob Cedergren, Helle Fagralid and Nicolas Bro, Sorrow and Joy is an autobiographical depiction of the life of a filmmaker and his teacher wife. In February 1984, while in a psychotic state, his wife killed their nine-month-old daughter in their home, while he was out delivering a lecture. The film took 272,000 admissions domestically.

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