Oscars - For Bollywood Oscars a big yawn again - Academy tends to favor European films as foreign nominations - by Priyanka Khanna
While the 80th Academy Awards for Merit has the global entertainment industry electrified, it has yet again bypassed India , the world's largest producers of films. Known as the world's most prestigious movie award, the glittering 13.5-inch statuette of a knight holding a crusader's sword on a reel of film continues to evade India , a land where filmmaking began at about the same time as the rest of the world. "Eklavya - The Royal Guard", India 's official entry this year for the Academy Award in Best Foreign Film category, failed to make it to the final list. It does seem the Academy tends to favor European films with France leading the foreign language film nominations with 34 in total and having bagged nine Oscars, and Italy following with 27 nominations and 10 wins. But the Oscar has also gone to movies with people from Arab, Far East and Slavic backgrounds.
Indian films never seem to have fitted the Oscar bill. Satyajit Ray, whom the Academy conferred with the "Lifetime Achievement Award" on his deathbed, never bagged a film-specific award. His "Pather Panchali" won 11 international awards, but no Oscar.
