The Playlist has learned the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has made a change to the voting process for the Foreign Language Film category that will go into effect this year. These new rules were explained in a letter recently sent to volunteer committee members. And, no, they aren’t allowing members in New York and London to join Los Angeles members in the first round of the voting process, but they are hoping a change to the current system will allow smaller films to flourish.
Previously, the first round of voting was conducted by what were known as color committees that were designated as red, white, blue and green. Each committee member was required to view 80% of the films their committee was assigned to. This often meant some of the lesser known films were being ignored. Moreover, you were allowed to watch and judge other movies not assigned to your committee (ie, the more popular ones). This protocol is being eliminated.
The new system will get rid of the color committees and assign individual films to each member participating in first round voting. The goal is to ensure that less publicized films get a fairer shot. After the members vote, the governing Foreign Language Committee, headed by longtime chair Mark Johnson, will select three additional films that make up the nine shortlisted for the second round of voting. By making these changes the hope is the FLF committee will be able to partially use those “saves” for lesser known films. There are rumors that the committee needed to use these saves to include “Toni Erdmann” and eventual Oscar winner “The Salesman” in the second round of voting for 2017. The previous system also allowed for the historic snub of “Elle” which became more embarrassing when its star, Isabelle Huppert, was nominated for Best Actress.
It should be noted that first round participants will still be allowed to vote on films they are not assigned. So popular films will still have a leg up in some respects.
Second round voting will continue to be made up of 30 handpicked Academy members who will screen the nine shortlisted films in New York, Los Angeles and London (10 in each city). Those members rank the nine films of which the top five are designated as the official and final nominees. Participants in the second round over the years have included Meryl Streep, Natalie Portman, Bennett Miller, Lupita N’yongo, Hugh Grant, David Hare and Tom Hanks among others.
What is still to be determined is how many first round films members will have to screen and what happens if they miss one or more. It’s also unclear if members can watch the required films via screening link or other means. It’s also distressing the Academy is still limiting this to just members in Los Angeles, but change comes slowly it seems.
There is no word officially why this change was made now, but new Academy president John Bailey has spent a number of years on the Foreign Language Film committee and is known as a champion of international cinema.
Major contenders for this year’s five nominees include “Loveless” (Russia), “BPM” (France), “A Fantastic Woman” (Chile), “The Square” (Sweden), “In the Fade” (Germany) and “First They Killed My Father” (Cambodia).
