Israel’s ‘Tell Me Everything’ Tops Ophir Awards, Becomes Country’s Oscar Submission — SkimNews
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- "Tell Me Everything" won Best Picture at Israel's Ophir Awards, automatically becoming the country's official entry in the 2027 Oscar Best International Feature race.
- Moshe Rosenthal's film collected 10 Ophir trophies including Best Director and Best Screenplay, after entering the night with a record 16 nominations.
- The film (Hebrew title "Independence") is set in 1987 Israel and follows 12-year-old Boaz (Yair Mazor) as he discovers his father (Assi Cohen) is gay, with the early AIDS pandemic as backdrop; Ido Tako plays the older Boaz in a reconciliation storyline set a decade later.
- "Tell Me Everything" had its world premiere at this year's Sundance Film Festival in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition before bowing in Israeli theaters on September 1.
- Israel has earned 10 Oscar nominations in the international category, most recently in 2011 for Joseph Cedar's "Footnote," with shortlist appearances in 2015 ("Foxtrot") and last year ("The Sea") but never an Oscar win.
- The 2027 Oscar international shortlist of 15 films will be revealed December 15, with final nominations announced January 21, 2027.
Why it matters: Israel's last Oscar nomination in the international category came in 2011 — every submission since has either missed the shortlist entirely or stopped at the 15-film cutoff, making Rosenthal's Ophir sweep the country's strongest launch pad in 15 years. The film's Sundance pedigree and 10-trophy haul give it unusually deep industry momentum heading into the December 15 shortlist reveal.
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