When the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Tuesday unveiled for the first time its shortlist of nominees for foreign-language Oscar, Rakyesh Omprakash Mehra's film was not on it. Until last year, the Academy only announced the list of final five nominees for Best Foreign Film along with the other nominations.
A Hindi-language film is on the list though -- Deepa Mehta's Water, Canada's official entry for the Oscars.
The other eight films on the shortlist are Days of Glory (Algeria), After the Wedding (Denmark), Avenue Montaigne (France), The Lives of Others (Germany), Pan's Labyrinth (Mexico), Black Book (The Netherlands), Volver (Spain) and Vitus (Switzerland).
On Tuesday, January 23, the Academy will announce the final five nominees for Best Foreign Film Oscar, along with the other nominations.
The Academy received 61 entries for Oscar for best Foreign Film this year.
Earlier, Variety reported, a Los Angeles-based committee of several hundred Academy members picked the five finalists. 'This year,' Variety said, 'for the first time, the panel chose the shortlisted nine. Now a group of 30 -- 10 members from the original committee, 10 new Los Angeles members and 10 New York members -- will whittle the nine down to five.'
Five years ago, another Aamir Khan film, his home production Lagaan made it to the final five nominations for Oscar for best foreign film, but lost out to Bosnia's No Man's Land.
Deepa Mehta's critically acclaimed Water is the highest grossing Hindi language film in the West.
The Oscar awards ceremony will be held on February 25.
More from rediff