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Ranking 2010s Foreign Oscar Winners List

The 2010s decade was a great decade for foreign films, but not so much for the Academy’s slates in that category. It’s an awkward decade where half of the winning movies were truly excellent choices, and the bottom ones were absolutely terrible choices. So without further ado, here is my ranking of all ten international winners for this decade.

10. The Great Beauty

The Great Beauty is easily the worst film on this list, the one that was simply appalling to me. This Sorrentino picture was utterly unoriginal in every sense of that word as he basically copied Fellini, and he did not offer anything new to the table. It’s well acted, but annoyingly pointless, bland and even annoying. In the year of ‘The Lunchbox’, this choice seems even more horrendous.

9. Parasite

Parasite ended up winning Best Picture, the first foreign film to do so. And while I did appreciate that outcome for what it means for the future of Hollywood and the Academy, I still find the film hugely mediocre. To me, Bong Joon-ho is a very overrated director, and here he made a mess of a film that never decides what it wants to be, and it utterly fails at all genres.

8. Ida

Ida isn’t a bad movie, but just a weak one. It’s a passable flick that benefits from strong black-and-white visuals, but it’s hurt by a particularly slow pace that made it a very dull watch. It’s not the worst film to have won during this decade, but it’s the most frustrating one as it somehow ended up beating ‘Leviathan’ and ‘Wild Tales’, both absolutely terrific films.

7. Amour

Amour won in the foreign category, but it was also nominated in some other worthy fields, including Best Actress and Best Picture. I find Michael Haneke’s movies quite cold, and this one is very slow and way too long, but it does have a couple of very moving and devastating moments, and it benefits from two truly tremendous central performances.

6. Son of Saul

While Son of Saul is overly ambiguous and mysterious in its narrative, it’s still a very good Hungarian war film that is at its best when wringing a lot of uncomfortable and thrilling feelings from its best realized scenes. It’s also very well crafted as a whole, and in particular superbly shot with very accomplished, interesting cinematography.

5. Roma

Roma most certainly represents the case of style over substance as the overall storyline is somewhat thin and maybe overly personal for Cuaron, but still there is no denying the power of its staggeringly beautiful black-and-white cinematography, some very moving moments and that stark, timeless and very classic cinematic feel to it. It should have won Best Picture that year.

4. In a Better World

Dark, thrilling and involving, In a Better World is one of a couple truly terrific Danish films during this decade. It is overly ambitious for its own sake, but it mostly met those ambitions as the themes are so well explored and important, and the characters share some very well developed relationships and conflicts. It’s a very dark, powerful film.

3. A Fantastic Woman

A Fantastic Woman did prove to be a difficult watch, but a necessary one for sure. I was so pleasantly surprised that this wonderful, important film dealing with the problems that transgender people face on a regular basis was honored with an Oscar. It’s very emotional and powered by one truly fantastic performance from striking Daniela Vega.

2. The Salesman

The Salesman is the type of drama film that I simply adore. It presents to us the audience one very precise situation, but it deals with it meticulously and from multiple levels. It is a thematically intriguing, emotionally unnerving and highly engaging Iranian film that is also superbly acted and unforgettable in its final prolonged sequence. It proves just what a magnificent director Asghar Farhadi is along with my number one pick.

1. A Separation

Yes, Farhadi ended up taking both my first and my second spot on this list, and even the Academy agreed by giving only him two Oscars during this decade. His direction here is absolutely fantastic as A Separation is simply the quintessential film about divorce in the history of cinema. It is a complex film that portrays life as it truly is – messy and complicated – without ever resorting to easy answers. It’s immensely touching in that final scene that is unforgettable and heartbreaking. A Separation is truly one of the best films of this entire decade.