India’s official entry ‘Laapataa Women’ out of Oscars 2025 race

Laapataa Women, India’s official entry within the Finest Worldwide Characteristic class on the 97th Academy Awards, is out of the Oscars race.
| Photograph Credit score: T-Sequence/YouTube

‘Laapataa Women’, India’s official entry within the Finest Worldwide Characteristic class on the 97th Academy Awards, is out of the Oscars race.

The Hindi movie, directed by Kiran Rao, is just not a part of the shortlist of 15 options that might be vying for a spot within the remaining 5, the Academy of Movement Image Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) introduced on Wednesday morning.

Nonetheless, British-Indian filmmaker Sandhya Suri’s “Santosh”, starring Indian actors Shahana Goswami and Sunita Rajwar, representing the UK, has made it to shortlist that additionally contains France’s “Emilia Pérez”, “I am Nonetheless Right here” (Brazil), “Common Language” (Canada), “Waves” (Czech Republic), “The Lady with the Needle” (Denmark), and “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” from Germany.

The opposite contenders are “Contact” (Iceland), “Kneecap” (Eire), “Vermiglio” (Italy), “Stream” (Latvia), “Armand” (Norway), “From Floor Zero” (Palestine), “Dahomey” (Senegal), and “The best way to Make Thousands and thousands earlier than Grandma Dies” (Thailand).

In accordance with the Academy, 85 nations or areas had submitted movies that had been eligible for consideration within the Worldwide Characteristic Movie class for the 97th Academy Awards.

Additionally learn | Politics of aesthetics: How ‘Laapataa Women’ bought a shot on the Oscars

Titled “Misplaced Women” in English, the movie is a gently subversive feminist drama which is about in rural India within the early 2000s. Sneha Desai wrote the screenplay and dialogues of “Laapataa Women”, based mostly on a narrative by Biplab Goswami. Divyanidhi Sharma penned extra dialogues.

“Laapataa Women” follows two brides who get swapped on the day of their wedding ceremony throughout a prepare trip. It stars Nitanshi Goel and Pratibha Ranta because the brides Phool and Jaya, respectively, with Sparsh Shrivastav taking part in the hapless groom in quest of his spouse.

The movie, which had its world premiere on the 2023 Toronto Worldwide Movie Competition (TIFF), launched in theatres on March 1 to nice critiques. It’s backed by Rao’s Kindling Productions, Aamir Khan Productions, and Jyoti Deshpande of Jio Studios.

In September, the Movie Federation of India (FFI) unanimously selected “Laapataa Women” as India’s official entry to the Oscars from a listing of 29 movies, together with Bollywood hit “Animal”, Malayalam Nationwide Award winner “Aattam” and Cannes winner “All We Think about As Gentle”.

On the time, the 13-member all-male jury of FFI courted controversy on social media for his or her quotation in regards to the movie. Many on social media stated the temporary went in opposition to the message the movie was attempting to convey.

The quotation by the federation learn: “Indian ladies are a wierd combination of submission and dominance. Properly-defined, highly effective characters in a single world, a Laapataa Women (Hindi) captures this variety completely, although in a semi-idyllic world and in a tongue-in-cheek manner.”

The makers additionally unveiled a brand new poster of the movie final month with its English title “Misplaced Women” because the film begins its marketing campaign for the upcoming awards ceremony. It additionally stars Chhaya Kadam, Ravi Kishan, and Geeta Agrawal Sharma.

“Lagaan”, set within the pre-independence period, was the final Indian movie to enter the highest 5 nominations in the most effective worldwide function movie class (previously known as finest international movie) at Oscars 2002.

Solely two different movies have beforehand made it to the ultimate 5 and they’re the Nargis-starrer “Mom India” and Mira Nair’s “Salaam Bombay!”

Final yr, “Naatu Naatu”, the peppy, foot-tapping chartbuster from SS Rajamouli’s Telugu interval motion movie “RRR”, received the Academy Award in the most effective authentic tune class together with “The Elephant Whisperers”, directed by Kartiki Gonsalves and produced by Guneet Monga’s Sikhya Leisure, profitable the Oscar within the Finest Documentary Brief Movie class.

The Oscar nominations might be introduced on January 17. Late night time host and comic Conan O’Brien will host the Academy Awards on March 2 on the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood, Los Angeles.