Foreign movies compete in multiple Oscar races

(Reuters)
Updated: 2007-01-24 10:00

Films from Algeria, Canada, Denmark, Germany and Mexico vie for the foreign-language Academy Award next month, and Clint Eastwood's Japanese language movie and the multilingual "Babel" will compete for best picture.

Eastwood's World War Two movie "Letters from Iwo Jima," documenting the Pacific island battle from Japan's perspective, won the Golden Globe for foreign-language film last week. But, as a U.S.-made work, it was not eligible for an Oscar. No foreign-language film has ever won the top Academy Award.

The foreign-language Oscar nominees, announced on Tuesday, were Algeria's "Days of Glory;" Canada's tale of India "Water;" Denmark's "After the Wedding;" Germany's "The Lives of Others," and Mexico's "Pan's Labyrinth," which tied for third among all Oscar contenders with six nominations.

"Days of Glory," directed by Rachid Bouchareb, depicts the poorly rewarded sacrifices by African troops to free occupied France during World War Two. Its cast won an ensemble acting award at the Cannes Film Festival in May, and the film helped bring about a change in the way France treats its veterans.

"Water," directed by Indian-born Canadian resident Deepa Mehta, revolves around an 8-year-old Hindu widow who is sent to an Indian ashram with other outcast widows. Mehta started shooting the movie in India in 2000, but mobs of religious protesters forced her to shut down production. She resumed work five years later in Sri Lanka with a different cast.

"The Lives of Others," a hit in Oxford-educated writer-director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's native Germany, is set in East Berlin during the 1980s.

German theater veteran Ulrich Muehe plays an operative in the secret police, who bugs the apartment of an intellectual couple, and becomes entwined in their lives with tragic consequences.

"After the Wedding," directed by Susanne Bier, stars Mads Mikkelsen, the villain in "Casino Royale," as a charity worker who returns home to Denmark and attends a wedding ceremony where various conflicts are brought out into the open.

"Pan's Labyrinth," from Mexican director Guillermo del Toro, is a violent fantasy set in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War. A little girl befriends the mythical title character, a sinister half-man, half-goat, while her evil stepfather battles remnants of Republican fighters.

"Babel," meanwhile, boasts performances in English, Spanish, Arabic, Japanese and French. Mexican actress Adriana Barraza and Japan's Rinko Kikuchi received nominations for their supporting roles.

Spanish actress Penelope Cruz, the star of Pedro Almodovar's "Volver" -- a surprise omission from the foreign-language race -- received a best actress nomination.