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These include doc­u­men­tary and inter­na­tion­al fea­ture, as well as orig­i­nal song, score and VFX.

The Acad­e­my of Motion Pic­ture Arts and Sci­ences unwrapped its short­lists for the 2021 Oscars in nine cat­e­gories, includ­ing doc­u­men­tary and inter­na­tion­al features.

Also released are the short­lists for orig­i­nal score, orig­i­nal song, make­up and hair­styling, visu­al effects, and doc­u­men­tary, live-action and ani­mat­ed short.

An unprece­dent­ed 238 doc­u­men­tary fea­tures and 93 inter­na­tion­al fea­tures were con­tend­ing for just 15 spots on each of their respec­tive short­lists. This year, both lists include Romania’s Col­lec­tive and Chile’s The Mole Agent. The doc short­list also includes vot­er sup­pres­sion doc All In: The Fight for Democ­ra­cy, while Bryan Fogel’s The Dis­si­dent, about the mur­der of jour­nal­ist Jamal Khashog­gi, was among the titles that didn’t advance.

The short­list for orig­i­nal score includes Trent Reznor and Atti­cus Ross, who were rec­og­nized both for their work on long­time col­lab­o­ra­tor David Fincher’s 1940-set peri­od biopic Mank and Pixar’s ani­mat­ed Soul, for which they cre­at­ed the ethe­re­al music of the ​“Great Before.” (The Nine Inch Nails mul­ti­hy­phen­ates pre­vi­ous­ly won an Oscar for the score to Fincher’s The Social Net­work.) Soul’s music was addi­tion­al­ly com­posed by Jon Baptiste.

Sim­i­lar­ly, Oscar-win­ner John Leg­end was cit­ed twice in the orig­i­nal song race, for ​“Nev­er Break” from the doc Giv­ing Voice and ​“Make It Work” from Jin­gle Jan­gle: A Christ­mas Jour­ney. That short­list also includes ​“Io Si (Seen)” from The Life Ahead, com­posed by 11-time Acad­e­my Award nom­i­nee Diane Warren.

Due to the pan­dem­ic, which caused many tent­poles to move from 2020 to 2021, this will be the first year since 2009 that the VFX short­list doesn’t con­tain at least one Mar­vel movie. The list includes The Mid­night Sky and Tenet, and all 10 titles will be fea­tured in the VFX branch­es’ annu­al bake-off, which this year will be held in a vir­tu­al for­mat on March. 6. The make­up and hair­styl­ists branch will hold a vir­tu­al bake-off fea­tur­ing their 10 short­list­ed movies on the same date.

Each of these short­lists will pro­duce the cat­e­go­ry nom­i­nees, which will be announced on March 15. The 93^rd Acad­e­my Awards will be pre­sent­ed on April 25, rather than its typ­i­cal win­dow in Feb­ru­ary, due to the pan­dem­ic. A for­mat has yet to be announced.

The com­plete short­lists follow.

DOC­U­MEN­TARY FEATURE

Fif­teen films will advance in the Doc­u­men­tary Fea­ture cat­e­go­ry for the 93^rd Acad­e­my Awards. Two hun­dred thir­ty-eight films were eli­gi­ble in the cat­e­go­ry. Mem­bers of the Doc­u­men­tary Branch vote to deter­mine the short­list and the nominees.

The films, list­ed in alpha­bet­i­cal order by title, are:

INTER­NA­TION­AL FEA­TURE FILM

Fif­teen films will advance to the next round of vot­ing in the Inter­na­tion­al Fea­ture Film cat­e­go­ry for the 93^rd Acad­e­my Awards. Films from 93 coun­tries were eli­gi­ble in the category.

Acad­e­my mem­bers from all branch­es were invit­ed to par­tic­i­pate in the pre­lim­i­nary round of vot­ing and must have met a min­i­mum view­ing require­ment to be eli­gi­ble to vote in the category.

In the nom­i­na­tions round, Acad­e­my mem­bers from all branch­es are invit­ed to opt in to par­tic­i­pate and must view all 15 short­list­ed films to vote.

The films, list­ed in alpha­bet­i­cal order by coun­try, are:

Bosnia and Herze­gov­ina, Quo Vadis, Aida?
Chile, The Mole Agent
Czech Repub­lic, Char­la­tan
Den­mark, Anoth­er Round
France, Two of Us
Guatemala, La Llorona
Hong Kong, Bet­ter Days
Iran, Sun Chil­dren
Ivory Coast, Night of the Kings
Mex­i­co, I’m No Longer Here
Nor­way, Hope
Roma­nia, Col­lec­tive
Rus­sia, Dear Com­rades!
Tai­wan, A Sun
Tunisia, The Man Who Sold His Skin