The Australian movie Tanna has made it to the Oscars shortlist as one of nine films still in the hunt for the best foreign language film at the 2017 Academy Awards.
The low-budget movie, shot in the Nauvhal language in Vanuatu with an amateur cast, most of whom had never even seen a movie before, was one of 85 films submitted for consideration in the category. It has now made it to the penultimate stage, with the final five nominees to be announced on January 24, 2017.
Tanna debuted at the Venice Film Festival in Septemer 2015, where it won the award for best film. In August it was selected by Screen Australia as our official entry in the Best Foreign Language Film category.
It is the 10th time an Australian movie has been submitted in this category. Previous contenders have included Warwick Thornton's Samson and Delilah (2009, filmed in the indigenous language Warlpiri), Cate Shortland's Lore (2012, German), Kim Mordaunt's The Rocket (2013, Lao) and two collaborations between director Rolf De Heer and actor David Gulpilil in the Yolngu Matha tongue, Ten Canoes (2006) and Charlie's Country (2014).
Only Samson and Delilah made as far as the shortlist, and to date none has been among the five Academy Award nominees.
Tanna was nominated for five AACTA awards, but won just one – best original music score, for Antony Partos, in the ceremony in Sydney two weeks ago.
It did, however, win the Australian Directors Guild award for co-directors Bentley Dean and Martin Butler in May.
Meanwhile, in the long list of 145 films being considered for nomination in the best original score category, Australia has four contenders. They are: Jed Kurzel for Assassin's Creed; David Hirschfelder for The Dressmaker; Nick Cave and Warren Ellis for Hell or High Water; and Ronnie Minder for The Legend of Ben Hall.
The shortlist
The nine movies shortlisted for Best Foreign Language Film, in alphabetical order by country, are:
Australia, Tanna (Bentley Dean, Martin Butler, directors)
Canada, It's Only the End of the World (Xavier Dolan, director)
Denmark, Land of Mine (Martin Zandvliet, director)
Germany, Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade, director)
Iran, The Salesman (Asghar Farhadi, director)
Norway, The King's Choice (Erik Poppe, director)
Russia, Paradise (Andrei Konchalovsky, director)
Sweden, A Man Called Ove (Hannes Holm, director)
Switzerland, My Life as a Zucchini (Claude Barras, director)