There were several examples just last year. Michael Haneke's CACHE,
which was submitted by Austria for the Foreign Film Oscar was ruled out
because most of the dialogue is in French.  A similar problem occurred
for MARIA FULL OF GRACE because too much of the dialogue was in English,
as was Singapore's BE WITH ME.  There was also controversy over how the
submitting entity would be designated for the Palestinian film PARADISE
NOW.  There is some dispute about whether the 2002 Palestinian film
DIVINE INTERVENTION was disqualified on grounds of nationality.  THE
MOTORCYCLE DIARIES also was disqualified because its production was too
international.  The Italian film PRIVATE was rejected by the Academy
because there was no Italian dialogue.

In the past, there have been other examples.  Kieslowski's RED could not
win Academy vetting because it was shot in Switzerland with a Polish
director and French actors.  That's globalism for you!  (Maybe there
should be at least a "European Community" category.)

The Uruguayan film was (as far as I know) the only one to have been
pulled after it had made the list of official nominees.  Of course, none
of this includes films that were never nominated by a country for
various reasons (politics being just one notable example).

Don Larsson
___________________________
"Nothing is ever the same as they said it was.  It's what I've never
seen before that I recognize."  --Diane Arbus
 
Donald F. Larsson
Department of English 
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Minnesota State University
Mankato, MN  56001
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Office Phone: 507-389-2368

-----Original Message-----
From: Film and TV Studies Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Miriam Ross
Sent: Thursday, November 23, 2006 9:24 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [SCREEN-L] Academy Awards for best foreign language film

Apologies for cross-posting

 I'm looking into the controversies surrounding films that have been
disqualified from the US Academy Awards for best foreign film due to
uncertainty surrounding the film's nationality or the languages it uses.
The
example I have right now is *Un lugar en el mundo* that was entered as a
Uruguayan film in 1993 but disqualified as it was thought to be from
Argentina.
Can anyone think of anymore notable examples and any literature or press
articles surrounding them
thanks
Miriam

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