Pakistan Jumps for ‘Joyland’

Pakistan’s Oscar selection committee, headed by double Oscar winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, has chosen Saim Sadiq’s “Joyland” as its entry for the Oscars’ international feature film race. The film had its world premiere at Cannes earlier this year where it won the Queer Palm and the jury prize at the festival’s Un Certain Regard strand.

The tale of sexual revolution sees a patriarchal family yearn for the birth of a baby boy to continue the family line, while their youngest son secretly joins an erotic dance theater and falls for an ambitious transsexual starlet.

Producers are Apoorva Guru Charan, Sarmad Sultan Khoosat (“Circus of Life”) and Lauren Mann (“The Card Counter”). It was produced through All Caps and Khoosat Films in association with Diversity Hire, One Two Twenty Entertainment, Blood Moon Creative, Film Manufacturers, Astrakan and Noruz Films, from producers Kathryn M. Moseley, Oliver Ridge, April Shih, and Katharina Otto-Bernstein.
Executive producers are Ramin Bahrani, William Olsson, Jen Goyne Blake, Tiffany Boyle, Elsa Ramo, Oleg Dubson, Kathrin Lohmann, Hari Charana Prasad, Sukanya Puvvula and Owais Ahmed.

View this article and see what other international films were selected for the Oscars at Variety.