‘Ulya’ Director Dives Into His Third Latvian Oscar Contender, Which Stars a Rising Actor as a Female Basketball Legend and Became a “Blockbuster”

Latvia has selected Viesturs Kairišs’s black-and-white film *Ulya* as its contender for the 2027 international feature film Oscar. Starring rising actor Kārlis Arnolds Avots as basketball legend Uljana Semjonova, the film traces her journey from a rural Old Believer community into elite sport and highlights the growing international reach of Baltic cinema.

Semjonova was a two-time Olympic and three-time world champion, won the Soviet national championship and European Champions Cup 15 times each, and became the first non-US woman inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. *Ulya* premiered at Cannes and will open Estonia’s Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival; it is a co-production between Latvia, Poland, Estonia and Lithuania. Director Kairišs says the film has become a blockbuster in Latvia, and it is his third film selected by the country as an Oscar contender.