Mistress Dispeller premiered at the Venice Film Festival all the way back in September 2024, but was released stateside in October of this year. From filmmaker Elizabeth Lo, the documentary focuses on a title character hired to break up a Chinese woman’s husband’s extramarital affair.

Among the 15 shortlisted docs in contention for the Academy Awards, Dispeller is one of the genre titles not in the politically charged space. Perhaps there’s a lane for one or two of them to make the cut. Reviews are solid with 95% on Rotten Tomatoes and 81 on Metacritic. If it gets into the quintet, it would be a surprise though the doc voters can be volatile. My Oscar Prediction posts will continue…