Japan Sends Hamaguchi Ryusuke's 'All of a Sudden' to the Oscars

Japan has chosen Hamaguchi Ryusuke's All of a Sudden as its entry for the international feature category at the 99th Academy Awards. The Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan (Eiren) made the selection, giving Hamaguchi his second turn representing the country in the category — the first was Drive My Car, which won the international feature Oscar at the 94th Academy Awards and collected additional nominations for best picture, director and adapted screenplay. Variety

The film arrives with serious festival credentials. It premiered in competition at Cannes in May, drawing a seven-minute standing ovation. Its two leads, Virginie Efira and Okamoto Tao, shared the festival's best actress prize — making Okamoto the first Japanese performer to win that award. Variety

All of a Sudden draws on a book of correspondence between a philosopher with terminal cancer and a medical anthropologist — When Life Suddenly Takes a Turn: Twenty Letters Between a Philosopher With Terminal Cancer and a Medical Anthropologist, by Miyano Makiko and Isono Maho. The cast includes Efira as Marie-Lou Fontaine, Okamoto as Morisaki Mari, Nagatsuka Kyōzō and Kurosaki Kōdai. It is a France-Japan co-production with backing from Germany and Belgium, shot largely in Paris. Variety

The release pattern is already in motion. The film opened in Japan on June 19 through Bitters End and in France on August 12 through Diaphana Distribution. North American audiences will get it on November 25, with Neon handling distribution — a date that lands squarely in the awards corridor, the stretch of late autumn when distributors position their most serious contenders for Academy voters. Variety

What happens from here follows a fixed path. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will consider submissions from countries around the world, narrow them to a shortlist of 15 films, then select five nominees. The 99th Academy Awards ceremony is scheduled for March 14, 2027. Variety

For Hamaguchi, the selection puts him back on a road he knows well. Drive My Car turned a four-hour road movie into one of the most decorated international features in recent Oscar history. Whether All of a Sudden can repeat that journey will depend on how voters respond to a film built on letters between two people facing mortality — and on how the competition shapes up across what is always a crowded field of country submissions.