“La Bola Negra,” the Spanish epic from Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, won the audience award for best feature at the BFI London Film Festival, the BFI announced Wednesday, Nov. 4. It’s one of the LGBTQ+ Oscar contenders for 2027, along with Andrew Scott’s “Elsinore,” which led Tuesday’s British Independent Film Awards nominations with 12, and Jordan Firstman’s “Club Kid,” which A24 opens in theaters today, Friday, Nov. 6.
The Academy will announce nominations Thursday, Jan. 21, 2027, and hand out the 99th Oscars on Sunday, March 14, 2027, at the Dolby Theatre, according to its official calendar. The show airs live on ABC and in “more than 200 territories worldwide,” the Academy said.
Calvo and Ambrossi, known as Los Javis, told Netflix’s Tudum they “wanted to tell a story about freedom, legacy, and the importance of LGBTQ+ visibility.” They added, “Above all, we wanted to honor the generations of people whose courage and sacrifice made our freedoms possible today.”
‘La Bola Negra’ Is Spain’s Pick for International Feature
Spain’s film academy chose “La Bola Negra” as its Oscar entry on Sept. 16 over Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “El ser querido” and Alauda Ruiz de Azúa’s “Los domingos,” EFE reported. Alejandro Amenábar read out the choice.
Its story jumps between three generations of men in 1932, 1937 and 2017, and the title comes from a play Federico García Lorca never finished, according to Netflix. At Cannes in May, Ambrossi said leaving out Lorca’s sexuality means “you’re robbing us (the gay community) of a role model,” Reuters reported.
Guitarricadelafuente plays Sebastián, alongside Miguel Bernardeau, Glenn Close and Penélope Cruz, who turns up briefly as Nené, a Spanish Civil War entertainer. “Films can’t change the world, but in some cases, they can help make things better,” Cruz told reporters at Cannes, Reuters reported.
Calvo and Ambrossi shared Cannes’ best director prize with Pawel Pawlikowski of “Fatherland,” the festival’s awards list shows. On Sept. 20, their film became the first non-English-language winner of TIFF’s People’s Choice Award since 2011, and TheWrap pointed out that “16 of the 18 People’s Choice winners have gone on to receive Academy Award nods for best picture” since 2008. The New Yorker’s Nov. 3 review, by Justin Chang, was far cooler, and the magazine’s summary of it says the film’s three timelines fit together “in ways more reductive than illuminating.”
“La Bola Negra will receive The Gotham Vanguard Tribute,” the Gotham Film & Media Institute said in an Oct. 22 release, and Guitarricadelafuente is up for the Gothams’ breakthrough performer prize. Netflix opened the film in New York and Los Angeles on Oct. 16, and its theater run has kept growing ahead of its Dec. 2 Netflix debut in the U.S. and Canada.
Andrew Scott Plays Ian Charleson’s Final Hamlet in ‘Elsinore’
Focus Features opens “Elsinore” in select theaters Nov. 20, then expands “over the Thanksgiving holiday and throughout December.” Scott plays Ian Charleson, the “Chariots of Fire” star who took over “Hamlet” from Daniel Day-Lewis at London’s National Theatre in late 1989 while he had AIDS, Gayety reported. Charleson died in January 1990.
“I think the biggest thing for me was to understand that he was a man who had a great zest for life,” Scott told Reuters when the film opened the London festival on Oct. 7. He said he wanted to “remember how he lived as much as how he died.”
Olivia Colman plays Dr. Margaret Johnson, who treated stigmatized patients during the AIDS crisis. “She was a hero, as were all the families, nurses, other doctors and friends who refused to be poisoned by the paranoia,” Colman told Reuters.
Scott, who told Variety in 2024 that being gay is the greatest joy of his life, is nominated for the Gothams’ lead performance prize. The Gothams will also give “Elsinore” a Legacy Tribute in Charleson’s honor. “In his final months, Ian Charleson affirmed his talent, his determination, and what it means to be an actor,” said Jeffrey Sharp, the institute’s executive director.
The film’s BIFA nominations include best British independent film, best director for Simon Stone, best screenplay and acting nods for Scott and Billie Piper, the BFI said. Winners are named Dec. 6 at London’s Roundhouse.
Jordan Firstman’s ‘Club Kid’ Parties Into Theaters Nov. 6
Firstman wrote, directed and stars in his first feature, which premiered in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes, according to the festival’s listing. A24’s synopsis follows “a hard-partying New York City club promoter” whose lifestyle gets upended “by the arrival of the 10-year-old son he never knew he had.”
The premiere set off a $17 million bidding war that A24 won, W magazine reported. “It’s more of a party movie, a drug movie, and a father-son movie. Kramer vs. Kramer with a queer twist,” Firstman told W.
In September, “Club Kid” took both the Grand Prix and the audience award at France’s Deauville American Film Festival. The Gothams nominated it for best feature and Firstman for breakthrough director, and Philadelphia’s festival gave it the narrative audience award, Variety reported Wednesday. “It’s been amazing to see the kinds of people that relate to this film, but it really is a movie about growth,” Firstman said in his recent Variety cover story.
Jane Schoenbrun’s “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” won Cannes’ Queer Palm, Allociné reported. Hannah Einbinder plays Kris, a filmmaker reviving a slasher franchise, and Screen Daily’s review said Einbinder plays her as “a pretentious, socially awkward lesbian who knows more about movies than real life.” Now streaming on Mubi, it has Gotham nominations for best feature, best director and Gillian Anderson’s lead performance.
Belgium, Austria, Mexico and Colombia Submit Queer International Features
Belgium entered Lukas Dhont’s “Coward,” which he called “a film about the power of togetherness in turbulent times,” VRT reported Aug. 25. His 2022 film “Close” was Belgium’s pick, too, and it earned a nomination.
Emmanuel Macchia and Valentin Campagne, who shared Cannes’ best actor prize, play World War I soldiers who fall in love around a makeshift front-line theater. “These men live in a time where their love had to be unspoken, had to be incredibly silent,” Dhont told Reuters at Cannes. “But weirdly enough, the war at that time brought them together.” Mubi plans a theatrical release starting Dec. 25, according to The Film Stage.
Austria entered Markus Schleinzer’s “Rose,” the Austrian Film Commission says, and Sandra Hüller won Berlin’s Silver Bear for best leading performance in it. She plays Rose, a former soldier who lives as a man in a 17th-century Protestant village and marries a woman named Suzanna. Screen Daily called the film a portrait of “a gender non-conforming individual in a society which is not forgiving of difference.” It opens in select U.S. theaters Dec. 11, The Film Stage reported.
Mexico’s film academy chose David Pablos’ “En el camino,” winner of the 2025 Queer Lion and the top prize in Venice’s Orizzonti section, Uno TV reported Aug. 26. It follows Veneno, a young drifter who hooks up with truckers at roadside restaurants, as he talks a gruff driver named Muñeco into taking him across northern Mexico.
Colombia’s academy picked Gala del Sol’s “Rains Over Babel,” which premiered at Sundance in 2025, Cinema Tropical reported Aug. 21. Cinema Tropical calls it “a mesmerizing and exuberant retro-futuristic queer twist on Dante’s Inferno.”
LGBTQ Oscar Contenders 2027: Shortlists Dec. 15, Nominations Jan. 21
Studios have until Thursday, Nov. 12, to submit films for best picture and the Academy’s general entry categories, its calendar shows. Firstman has already asked Scott for awards-season tips. “I’m curious if you have advice for me. What’s your sleep like? How do you sleep?” he said in their Interview magazine conversation.
“Are you changing the subject completely?” Scott replied.
The Gothams name winners Nov. 30 at Cipriani Wall Street in New York, and the Academy posts its shortlists Tuesday, Dec. 15. Nominations voting runs Jan. 11 to 15, and final voting closes March 4, 10 days before the 99th Oscars air live on ABC on Sunday, March 14.
