Oscars 2025: Film Federation of India UNDER FIRE as Hansal Mehta FURIOUSLY SLAMS Laapataa Ladies’ SHOCKING Shortlist Snub
The official entry from India for the 97th Academy Awards, Laapataa Ladies, did not manage to make it to the final shortlist for Best International Feature Film. The entire fraternity of film and critics castigated the decision and also called for a heated debate against it. The first critics were filmmaker Hansal Mehta and his attack at the selection process of the Film Federation of India (FFI).
On 18 December 2024, Hansal Mehta went to X (formerly Twitter) and shared a screenshot of the Oscars shortlist. With that, he wrote, “Film Federation of India does it again! Their strike rate and selection of films year after year is impeccable.” Mehta’s sarcasm pointed out what he sees as a long-standing problem in the way India goes about picking films for the Oscars.
The Controversy Surrounding Laapataa Ladies
Produced by Aamir Khan and directed by Kiran Rao, Laapataa Ladies is a comedy-drama starring Nitanshi Goel, Pratibha Ranta, Sparsh Shrivastava, Chhaya Kadam, and Ravi Kishan. It was widely acclaimed in India but drew no international attention, prompting many to wonder why the film was chosen as India’s Oscar entry.
Grammi Award-winning musician Ricky Kej also commented on the conversation by saying that Laapataa Ladies was not the right choice to represent India. He said, “A very well-made, entertaining movie (I enjoyed it) but absolutely the wrong choice to represent India for the Best #InternationalFeatureFilm category. As expected, it lost.”
Kej criticized a little further, highlighting that India showed a repeated trend of choosing the mainstream Bollywood instead of artistically driven cinema. “When are we going to realize. year after year. we are choosing the wrong films. There are so many excellent movies made, and we should be winning the #InternationalFeatureFilm category every year!”
All We Imagine as Light
Many netizens agreed with Hansal Mehta and Ricky Kej that Payal Kapadia’s film, All We Imagine as Light, would have easily been included. International recognition has welcomed this same film by winning Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival and being nominated in Golden Globe Awards and Critics’ Choice Awards and multiple more accolades.
One of the social media users was lamenting, “AWIAL will forever be a ‘what-if.’ The sentiment reflects the frustration that many cinephiles express when they feel India continually misses films that could truly win or stand a chance on the international arena.
The Broader Debate on India’s Oscar Strategy
There is a lot of controversy surrounding this. Indians do not have the best history regarding the Oscars. In fact, a very small number of films-three at most-even reached the Best International Feature nomination list, and fewer still won: Mother India (1957), Salaam Bombay! (1988), and Lagaan (2001).
The critics aver that at times, the Film Federation of India fails to represent those who are supposed to do so according to the expectations from the Academy in terms of art or message but favours those which succeeded commercially or pleased the general public.
According to Ricky Kej, the crux of the problem can be succinctly put by stating that we live in a “Mainstream Bollywood” bubble and cannot look beyond the movies we ourselves find entertaining. In lieu, one should just look for great films made by uncompromising filmmakers in art-both low budget or big-budget, star or no star, just great artistic cinema.
This feeds the debate that calls for more transparent and inclusive selection procedures. As diverse films come out of India every year, the challenge here is in finding those films that cater to global sensibilities as well as showcase the best cultural tapestry of the country.
Well, for now, Laapataa Ladies will always serve as a reminder of failure at the Oscars shortlist stage, and this calls for introspection and reforms with how India looks into its Academy Awards submission process. Will the Film Federation of India learn from it? Only time will tell. Meanwhile, the conversation continues-cinephiles and filmmakers alike hoping for a better and brighter chapter in the journey of India at the Oscars.
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