This year’s crop of Oscar international film submissions reminds us that danger is seemingly everywhere. It can be in the context of a reformed drug lord musical (“Emilia Pérez”), a globe-altering flood (“Flow”), or a family being torn apart by an authoritarian society (“The Seed of the Sacred Fig”). The three films below prove that great performances, incredible music and a sliver of hope can transcend the weight of universal fear.

‘Armand’

Swedish filmmaker Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel may be the grandson of legendary director Ingmar Bergman, but for a portion of his life, he worked as an assistant teacher in an after-school program with 6-year-old children and their parents. Those experiences formed part of the inspiration for “Armand,” which won the Camera d’Or (first feature award) at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

The stylish drama focuses on the ramifications of an altercation between two elementary-school-age kids. As the school staff attempts to quell the matter, personal conflicts between the two sets of parents threaten to derail any potential resolution. Tøndel’s initial inspiration wasn’t the conflict itself but the single mother portrayed by “The Worst Person in the World” star Renate Reinsve.

“I had this woman in my mind who was totally smart, manipulative, strong in one moment and then completely helpless in the next,” Tøndel says. “And then I heard a story about two 6-year-old boys on a camping trip. One of them said to the other something quite adult-like. And my imagination started spinning based on that.”

As the rollercoaster deliberations between the parties intensify, Reinsve’s character experiences what can only be described as an emotional breakdown. It’s a breathtaking moment — noted in the screenplay — that finds her laughing and crying on screen for almost 10 minutes.

As Tøndel recalls, “Renate read the script and asked me, ‘How long is a long time?’ And I said, ‘Around seven minutes.’ And she said, ‘It’s impossible, I can’t do it.’ And I said, ‘Yes, you can.’ And then we never talked about the scene again. And then she came on set, and it was absolutely mind-blowing. She laughed for a whole day, 10 hours straight.”

Admitting it was “too many times,” he adds, “she got five days off after the scene.”

‘Kneecap’

Rich Peppiatt had been in Belfast, Northern Ireland, for only two weeks when he saw a sign promoting an Irish hip-hop night. Needing a respite from a crying newborn, he stuck his head in a bar and saw three guys, a band known as Kneecap, throwing baggies of white powder into the crowd. Every other word was an expletive, and he didn’t understand what they were saying, but their energy and talent were electric.

“I did not realize there was this young, vibrant community of Irish language speakers in a metropolitan hub like Belfast,” Peppiatt says. “I think as a filmmaker when you find a precinct that feels like it’s not had a light shot on it you’ve got the start of something. You’re going to go, ‘OK, well, if this is news to me and I live here, it’s going to be news to millions of potential people out there.’”

The band includes Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap, and DJ Próvaí, all of whom play versions of themselves in the appropriately titled “Kneecap.” The fact they were wary when Peppiatt initially approached them was understandable. Even with the amount of success they were having in their native land, hooking up with an untested filmmaker didn’t make much sense.

“You’re an unsigned local band. You’ve never made an album, right? And you are rapping a language no one speaks. It doesn’t exactly scream Hollywood blockbuster, right? They were a bit dubious that I could actually see it through,” Peppiatt admits. What changed his fortune was “that night one pint of Guinness turned into eight or nine pints of Guinness, and then it was back to their house afterward. And that was my big test: Can I keep pace with Kneecap, and am I not a cop? That was the other thing they say is, ‘Make sure he is not a cop.’”

Spoiler: A world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, U.S. distribution and Ireland selecting the movie as its international film submission, pretty much proves that Peppiatt was not a cop.

Juan Jesús Varela stars in “Sujo.”

(Ximena Amann / Sundance Institute)

‘Sujo’

Over the past decade, Fernanda Valadez and Astrid Rondero have worked together on several projects, but “Sujo” is their first directorial collaboration. Considering the film has earned much critical acclaim and won the world cinema grand jury prize for a dramatic film at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, the duo may want to make their partnership behind the camera a regular thing.

Set in contemporary Mexico, “Sujo” centers on the title character, portrayed by relative newcomer Juan Jesús Varela, a young man hidden by his protective aunt from the prying eyes of the local cartel bosses. As his cousins get swept up in the cartel business, Sujo escapes to Mexico City, where he hopes to pursue his dreams of academic study. Despite the expansive urban environment, he soon learns how difficult it is to hide from your past. Especially when your father was a legendary sicario (hit man).

Valadez says they wanted Sujo to show the audience the thin line between victims and perpetrators and how someone can transition from one to the other depending on the social conditions.

“We have a father that is a perpetrator, but at the same time is a loving father who [passes along] both things to his son,” Valadez says. “So, this son has those paths combined, the ability to become a loving man, but also the burden of violence in his life. What we want to say with this film is that even the people who commit crimes, who become perpetrators, were at some point vulnerable kids to which we still have a debt as a society.”

The duo had been scouting locations for 12 years and had some connections within the community that kept them safe. That being said, over the last five to six years Guanajuato has been one of the most dangerous states in Mexico. And they did have an encounter with cartel members trying to collect protection money.

“It was scary,” Valadez admits. “We got support from the local authorities, so we went there unharmed. But of course, it makes you think about what you should do as a production company to keep your crew safe because we have a lot of young people with us — 20, 22, 23 years old — and that’s a lot of responsibility.”