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Sandra Wollner’s “Everytime” has been selected as Germany’s entry for the Academy Award for best international feature film.
The film’s synopsis reads as follows: The last photograph Jessie took shows the sun over Berlin.
It hangs there as if nothing had happened. But Ella has lost her daughter. What remains is Jessie’s younger sister and a complicated relationship with the boy everyone blames. The unlikely trio ends up on a family holiday that never really existed. Under the shimmering sun of Tenerife, memory and the present become inseparably intertwined. The ghosts are everywhere.
“Everytime” celebrated its world premiere at the 79th Cannes Film Festival in May. Wollner’s third feature film, for which she also wrote the screenplay, was selected for the Un Certain Regard sidebar where it won the Prix Un Certain Regard, the section’s top award. Cannes was followed by invitations to the Sydney Film Festival and the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, among others. At the Sarajevo Film Festival, “Everytime” was awarded the Heart of Sarajevo Grand Prize. Its North American premiere will follow in September at the Toronto Film Festival. Other festival appearances include the New York Film Festival.
Germany’s Oscar jury said, “In ‘Everytime,’ director and writer Sandra Wollner achieves the remarkable feat of making grief tangible as a world thrown into disarray through purely cinematic means and with a surprising lightness of touch. The outstanding cinematography creates a shimmering and at times ethereal atmosphere without intruding on the characters. The ensemble of actors is convincing in its naturalness, with the characterizations remaining consistently precise and ambivalent. Playing elegantly with form and narrative ellipses, ‘Everytime’ explores the interstices of the pain of loss. Memory and the present, reality and imagination flow into one another almost imperceptibly, making this film a truly poetic cinematic experience.”
German distributor Eksystent Filmverleih Kijas released “Everytime” in German cinemas on Aug. 6. Charades is handling international sales. It was sold to more than 30 territories worldwide. In North America, 1-2 Special is handling distribution, with a theatrical release planned for early 2027.
Due to a change in the rules of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences this spring, two major German films are already eligible for submission in the international feature film category: Visar Morina’s “Shame and Money” qualified by winning the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, as did İlker Çatak’s “Yellow Letters” by winning the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.
The 15-title shortlist of eligible films for the international feature film Oscar race will be announced on Dec. 15. The five nominated titles that will enter the race will be revealed on Jan. 21. The Academy Awards ceremony will take place on March 14.
