The announcement was made yesterday by Norway's Oscar Committee that had shortlisted Sewitsky's film with two other possible candidates: Oslo, August, 31st and Sons of Norway. Sewitsky's feature debut scripted by Ragnhild Tronvoll is a delicate and upbeat relationships film starring Agnes Kittelsen, Henrik Rafaelsen, Maibritt Saerens and Joachim Rafaelsen. The film was released in Norway last November and reached world attention two months later when it won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. "Happy, Happy is a film that found us identifying with characters very different from our own lives," said at the time jury member Susanne Bier. Since then, the film has travelled to many world festivals, winning other awards such as Best Screenplay in Brussels last June. Over 50 territories acquired it from TrustNordisk. Recent foreign territories where it opened to very positive reviews include France (Happiness Distribution). The Academy Awards nominations will benefit the US release via Magnolia Pictures set for September 16, 2011.
The five nominations for Best Foreign Language Film will be announced on January 24, 2012 and the Oscars ceremony in Los Angeles will take place on February 26.
Happy, Happy will have a theatrical release in Denmark (Camera Film) and Finland (Biorex) with the Nordic High Five support from Nordisk Film & TV Fond.