Oscar Nods to Israel, Allen, Spielberg
January 25, 2012
Los Angeles (JTA) -- The Israeli film Footnote and veteran Jewish filmmakers Woody Allen and Steven Spielberg are up for Academy Awards.
Israel's hope for its first Oscar was kept alive with Joseph Cedar's Footnote, listed among the five finalists in the foreign-language film category. The story of the rivalry between two Talmudic scholars, who are also father and son, marks the second Oscar nod for Cedar following Beaufort in 2007.
The toughest competition for Israel will likely come from Iran's entry, A Separation, which won the Golden Globe earlier this month, and the Polish film In Darkness. Agnieszka Holland (Europa, Europa), whose Jewish father was killed in the Warsaw Ghetto and whose non-Jewish mother fought in the ghetto's uprising and was a member of the Polish underground, tells the true-life story of a dozen Jewish men, women and children who hid in the underground sewers of Lvov for 14 months during the Nazi occupation of Poland.
Allen was tapped for best director and best original screenplay for Midnight in Paris, which also was nominated for best picture along with Spielberg's epic World War I movie War Horse. However, Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin, which won a Golden Globe, did not qualify in the best animated film competition.