94th Academy Awards: OLGA is Switzerland’s official submission

The talented 15-year-old Ukrainian gymnast Olga (Anastasia Budiashkina) lives in exile in Switzerland. She gives everything to secure her place on the national team. But then the Euromaidan uprising breaks out in Kiev, suddenly involving everyone she cares about. While Olga is preparing for the European Championship, the revolution enters her life and turns it upside down.

The jury explained its decision for the film with the following statement: “With Elie Grappe’s first feature film OLGA, the jury is sending into the race both a film and a directorial talent with a clear cinematic vision and craftsmanship. Precise, stylistically confident and with grace, Elie Grappe depicts the life of his protagonist (…) and presents her moral conflict in a visceral, contemporary and poignant manner for the big screen.”

A feature film debut with a stunning start

OLGA, the first feature film by the young director Elie Grappe, was invited straight away to compete in the prestigious Semaine Internationale de la Critique in Cannes, where Grappe and his co-author Raphaëlle Desplechin were honoured with the SACD Award 2021 for Best Screenplay.

In August, the film was screened in the Horizons section at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. And in September, the industry audience in North America will have the opportunity to see the film in a market screening during the Toronto International Film Festival.

Director Elie Grappe was born in Lyon in 1994. Following his studies in classical music, he attended École Cantonale d’Art de Lausanne ECAL from 2011 to 2021. Grappe’s two short films RÉPÉTITION and SUSPENDU, which he completed during his film studies, met with great success at numerous international film festivals.

OLGA is a coproduction by Point Prod (Jean-Marc Fröhle), RTS Radio Télévision Suisse in Switzerland together with French Cinéma Defacto, with the participation of Canal plus. World sales were acquired by Pulsar Content in France. The distributor in Switzerland is Cineworx, in France ARP Sélection. The film is scheduled for theatrical releases in November.

SWISS FILMS facilitates the Oscar campaign

The Federal Office of Culture has assigned SWISS FILMS, the promotion agency, the task of coordinating and carrying out the selection process for Switzerland’s official submission in the International Feature Film category of the Academy Awards. SWISS FILMS accompanies and supports the promotion campaign of the Swiss entry with financial and communication resources.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will announce the short list in December, followed by the five nominated films on February 8, 2022. The award ceremony of the Oscars will take place at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on March 27.

SWISS FILMS, September 6, 2021

Press

Grappe has a wonderful eye for the rhythms of training, for the snaps of the beam, the soft thud of the feet, and turns his film into a sort of balletic tribute to the gymnasts’ movements. Screen

Budiashkina is a terrific presence, and film is in thrall to her powers. Anyone wondering about the mental crises afflicting young gymnasts – or the potential for abuse in this world - will find Olga a true revelation. Screen

Olga is about the identity struggle of a woman torn between her personal ambition and her attachment to her homeland. Variety

A film centred on the bodies of gymnasts in action, with their rituals, their few words and the implacable quality of successes and failures, Olga captures, with an excellent sense of atmosphere, the paradoxes of adolescents perfecting a total control over their emotions even as they are boiling inside them. Cineuropa