in ,

Nine Foreign Language Films, including The Intouchables and War Witch, Advance in Oscar Race

Nine Foreign Language Films, including The Intouchables and War Witch, Advance in Oscar RacePosted by Wilson Morales

Source: THR

Nine features, including Michael Haneke‘s Palme d’Or winner Amour and the huge commercial hit The Intouchables, have made the shortlist from which five nominees for the best foreign-language film Oscar will be chosen.

Listed alphabetically by country, they are:

Austria, Amour, Michael Haneke, director

Canada, War Witch, Kim Nguyen, director

Chile, No, Pablo Larraín, director

Denmark, A Royal Affair, Nikolaj Arcel, director

France, The Intouchables, Olivier Nakache and Eric Toledano, directors

Iceland, The Deep, Baltasar Kormákur, director

Norway, Kon-Tiki, Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg, directors

Romania, Beyond the Hills, Cristian Mungiu, director

Switzerland, Sister, Ursula Meier, director

Seventy-one countries submitted films for consideration this year. The shortlist was determined by a committee of several hundred Academy members which chose six titles. The Academy’s Foreign Language Film Award Executive Committee then chose three more titles to create the shortlist of nine films.

Specially-invited committees in New York and Los Angeles will now view the nine films, from which the five nominees will be selected.

Several of the films, like Amour and The Intouchables, will also be eligible to compete in other categories, since they have also received theatrical releases in the U.S. via Sony Pictures Classics and The Weinstein Company, respectively.

Academy Awards nominations will be announced Jan. 10, and the Oscar ceremonies will take place Feb. 24.

Director Kim Nguyen talks War Witch

Watch first episode of Keith Josef Adkins’ new SciFi series ‘The Abandon’