The Chilean Academy of Film has announced today that the debut feature by Felipe Gálvez Haberle, The Settlers / Los colonos, will represent the South American nation in the international competition at the 96th edition of the Academy Awards. The film had its world premiere in the Un Certain Regard competition at the last edition of the Cannes Film Festival, and it will premiere soon in North America at the Toronto and New York film festivals.
The period film, starring Mark Stanley, Camilo Arancibia, Benjamin Westfall, and Alfredo Castro, is set in the south of Chile in 1901, and tells the story of a wealthy landowner hires three horsemen to mark out the perimeter of his property and open a route to the Atlantic Ocean across Patagonia. The expedition, composed of a young Chilean mestizo, an American mercenary and a reckless British lieutenant, soon turns into a “civilizing” raid.
This year’s competition for the Chilean Oscar candidacy was particularly strong, as The Settlers won over Maite Alberdi’s Sundance-winning The Eternal Memory, Pablo Larraín upcoming Venice title The Count, El vacío by Gustavo Graef Marino, and Punto de encuentro by Roberto Baeza.
Chile is one of the three Latin American countries that have one the Oscar for Best International Motion Picture. The South American country won the Oscar in 2019 for A Fantastic Woman by Sebastián Lelio, and was also nominated in 2012 for Pablo Larraín’s No. In 2020, Alberdi was shortlisted with her previous film The Mole Agent, which was nominated for Best Documentary.
