Canada’s Oscar Bet Is Nina Roza

Telefilm Canada has picked Nina Roza, a Berlinale screenplay winner, for the Oscars' international race, and Canadians can rent or buy it on demand from 13 October.

By Andrew Lovesey October 10, 2026 5 min read

Photo: Best Friend Forever

Canada has its film for the Oscars’ international race, and viewers will not have to wait for a festival ticket to see it. Telefilm Canada announced on 25 August that Nina Roza, written and directed by Geneviève Dulude-De Celles, will represent Canada in the Best International Feature Film category at the 99th Academy Awards. Its Canadian distributor, Entract Films, lists it to buy and rent on demand from 13 October.

The film

In Telefilm’s description, the story starts when “a viral video of an 8-year-old Bulgarian artist catches the eye of a major art collector.” It is a Colonelle Films production made with partners in Italy, Bulgaria and Belgium, produced by Sarah Mannering and Fanny Drew. The cast includes Galin Stoev, Sofia Stanina, Ekaterina Stanina, Michelle Tzontchev, Christian Bégin and Chiara Caselli.

The film had its world premiere in Competition at the 76th Berlinale, where Dulude-De Celles won the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay. According to Telefilm, it also won the Audience Award at the Sofia International Film Festival and two awards at Locarno Pro in 2025. It opened the 44th Rendez-vous Québec Cinéma on 22 April as its North American premiere and reached Quebec theatres on 24 April, according to the festival’s organizers.

This fall it played in the feature competition at the Festival International du Film Francophone de Namur in Belgium, which ran 30 September to 4 October. Telefilm says it will also screen at AFI Fest, which the American Film Institute has set for 21 to 25 October in Los Angeles.

How it was picked

Telefilm says a pan-Canadian committee of 24 members, drawn from government agencies and national film industry associations, chose Nina Roza from 17 submitted films. Telefilm chairs the committee but does not vote.

“Being selected to represent Canada is a prestigious distinction that speaks to the excellence of this work,” said Julie Roy, Telefilm’s executive director and CEO. “The journey ahead is as exceptional as it is demanding, as some of the year’s most acclaimed films enter the race from around the world.”

The road to March

The field is wide. Telefilm notes that 92 countries submitted films in this category last year, and 86 were declared eligible by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The Academy’s calendar sets three dates that matter:

Tuesday 15 December 2026: shortlists announced, with 15 films in this category.
Thursday 21 January 2027: nominations, when the list narrows to five.
Sunday 14 March 2027: the 99th Oscars, live on ABC.

Canada’s record in the category, per Telefilm: eight Canadian films have been nominated, and one has won, Denys Arcand’s The Barbarian Invasions in 2004.

The Los Angeles screening

AFI Fest has now posted its schedule. The festival lists Nina Roza in its World Cinema section for one screening, on Sunday 25 October at 1:45 pm in Chinese 5, followed by a conversation with Dulude-De Celles. AFI says the screening is open to members and passholders and gives the running time as 104 minutes, with dialogue in French and Bulgarian. Our guide, AFI Fest Turns 40: A Guide, covers passes and the rest of the lineup.

The film has also been on the Canadian festival circuit this fall. The Calgary International Film Festival programmed it as an Alberta premiere during its 24 September to 4 October run, listing the languages as Bulgarian, English and French with English subtitles.

The story, in a little more detail

Telefilm’s one-line description leaves out the central character. The Calgary festival’s synopsis fills it in: Mihail, who left Bulgaria in the 1990s after his wife’s death, now lives in Montreal with his young daughter Roza. An art specialist, he is hired to authenticate the paintings of Nina, the eight-year-old whose work has gone viral, and agrees to travel back to Bulgaria to find her, a trip AFI describes as his first return in three decades. Twins Sofia and Ekaterina Stanina play Nina, according to AFI, and the Calgary festival lists Galin Stoev, Michelle Tzontchev, Chiara Caselli and Christian Bégin in the cast.

The director’s earlier work

Nina Roza is Dulude-De Celles’s second fiction feature. Telefilm Canada notes that her first, A Colony (2019), premiered at the Berlinale and won the Crystal Bear for best film in Generation Kplus, then won the Canadian Screen Award for best motion picture. Before that, her short The Cut won a Short Film Jury Award at Sundance in 2014, and she has made the documentaries Welcome to F.L. (2015) and Days (2023). That makes Nina Roza her second film to premiere at Berlin, this time in the main competition.

Canada’s eight nominees

Telefilm lists all eight Canadian films nominated in the category: The Decline of the American Empire (1987), Jesus of Montreal (1990), The Barbarian Invasions (2004), Water (2007), Incendies (2011), Monsieur Lazhar (2012), In Darkness (2012), a minority co-production with Poland and Germany, and War Witch (2013). Years are as Telefilm gives them.

For how festival prizes now feed into the race, see The Oscar Race Gets a Side Door. The Pacific entries are profiled in Australia’s Oscar Bet Is First Light and Mārama Carries New Zealand’s Oscar Hopes.

Where to watch

Nina Roza · On demand, buy or rent · CA · From 13 Oct, per Entract Films (stores not yet named)
Nina Roza · AFI Fest, Los Angeles · US · Festival runs 21 to 25 Oct; screening Sunday 25 Oct at 1:45 pm, Chinese 5, followed by a conversation with Geneviève Dulude-De Celles