Spain is widely seen as having one of the strongest and most competitive fields to choose from when it comes to determining its best international feature film submission for the 2027 Oscars.
On Thursday, the country unveiled a shortlist of three movies remaining in contention before a final pick is unveiled on Sept. 16.
And the candidates are… The Beloved by Rodrigo Sorogoyen, La bola negra (The Black Ball) by Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, aka Los Javis, or the two Javiers, and Sundays by Alauda Ruiz de Azúa.
The first two films were Cannes breakouts earlier this year. However, the third Spanish movie in the Cannes 2026 competition program, Bitter Christmas, and its big-name director, Pedro Almodóvar, didn’t make the Thursday shortlist.
The Black Ball, an epic about gay men in war-torn Spain, is a big Netflix hope for the Oscars. Its director duo won the best director award at Cannes. “It is high time we had a gay war epic of this scope and soulfulness and invention,” THR‘s review highlighted, calling the movie “a dazzling mix of contemporary pop sensibility and classical filmmaking.”
Meanwhile, The Beloved features the star power of Javier Bardem. “Bardem is terrific in the role of a hardened filmmaker with a shady past and shitty reputation who still has talent to burn,” THR’s review emphasized.
The third contender shortlisted by the Spanish academy, the Basque family drama Sundays, was the big winner of the latest Goya awards in Spain and also won the Golden Shell at last year’s San Sebastián Film Film Festival.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Scienceswill unveil the 15 films on the best international feature film shortlist on Dec. 15. The five nominees will be announced Jan. 21, 2027. The 99th Academy Awards ceremony will take place on March 14, 2027.
