I've just posted an interview with
Stefan Ruzowitzky, the director of
The Counterfeiters, one of the films up for the Best Foreign Language Film award at the Oscars on Sunday. For a while I've been meaning to write something about this particular category of the Academy Awards, as it has taken a lot of flak this year.
Firstly, there was the controversy surrounding the disqualification of
The Band's Visit, something which generated a huge number of column inches. There was much anger aimed at the producers of
Beaufort — who were the people who first pointed out to the Israeli Academy that
The Band's Visit had over 50% English and was therefore not eligible — especially when
Beaufort replaced it as Israel's selection. This grievance was understandable, but what I did not agree with was the criticism that was aimed at AMPAS, the body that runs the Academy Awards. They were slammed for disqualifying
The Band's Visit because their rules state that for a film to be eligible it must contain no more than 50% English dialogue. Despite people regularly calling this award "Best Foreign Film," it is in fact called the Best Foreign
Language Film and all that happened was that the rules were adhered to. People seemed to overlook this nuance, and felt because
The Band's Visit was such a good film that this made its disqualification particularly unjust. Unfortunately, a film's merits do not affect straightforward regulations. (Interestingly, there was no such uproar when
Alvin and the Chipmunks was similarly disqualified from Oscar's animated category for being 70% live action and only 30% cartoon...)
When AMPAS announced the shortlist of nine foreign language films from which the five nominees would be chosen, there was once again widespread unrest. In this case, it was because films like
Persepolis,
Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days and
The Orphanage had not been selected. And this is where my feelings on AMPAS diverge from the majority. As I see it, the foreign language category is the most democratic of them all on Oscar night — and that can only be a good thing.
Persepolis,
Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days and
The Orphanage were denied a shot at the Oscar, yet by that stage all three were already internationally acclaimed movies with U.S. distribution deals.
Beaufort, distributed in the U.S. by Kino, is another of the nominees on Sunday night. Last year, I interviewed its director, Joseph Cedar, as well as Eran Kolirin, the director of
The Band's Visit. (You can read the piece
here.) After the interview was over, Cedar and I chatted for 15 minutes or so and he asked me whether I thought
Beaufort had a chance of being chosen from the 60-odd international selections to be one of the five nominees. I had to tell him that he had a chance because
Beaufort is such an excellent film, but that every year it's a crap shoot.
The selection panel for the foreign language Oscar are often characterized as old and out of touch, yet whether or not this is true every year the five films chosen as nominees are, without fail, a total surprise. It is the one category where people watching the films seem to judge them based purely on their reaction, rather than being swayed by a film's percentage rating on Rotten Tomatoes, box office takings or, most significantly, huge billboards or ads in
Variety shouting "For Your Consideration." As a result, films with U.S. distribution deals are chosen alongside movies dismissed as too "small" or too risky by distributors. And, for the most part, those films then magically get U.S. distribution. Knowing they can put the words "Oscar" and "Nominated" in big letters on the poster is seemingly sufficient for distributors to change their mind about those previously shunned movies. As a result, this year Oscar has all but guaranteed us the new films from Nikita Mikhalkov, Andrzej Wajda and Sergei Bodrov – three undeniably great directors —
in addition to films like
Persepolis,
Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days and
The Orphanage.
Variety recently
reported that producer Mark Johnson, currently the chairman of AMPAS' foreign language branch, is lobbying for its reform, exactly because of the omission of films like
Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days. "I feel the committee doesn't reflect the Academy at large and I have to do something to effect that,” Johnson said. “We can change things so we can incorporate some different voices.” I personally feel that what the current system offers is exactly that – different voices – and hope that will continue to be the case for the foreseeable future.
# posted by Nick Dawson @ 2/19/2008 10:47:00 PM
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