Rithy Panh Documentary Makes Oscars Shortlist

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Friday named Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh’s autobiographical documentary “The Missing Picture” among nine movies short-listed for a foreign language film nomination for next year’s Oscars.

The film was among 76 entries for the shortlist, and would be the first Cambodian movie nominated for on Oscar if it makes the final list of five to be announced on January 16. Mr. Panh’s documentary is up against films from Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Denmark, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Italy and Palestine. The Oscars will be awarded on March 2.

It has already been a stellar year for Mr. Panh. “The Missing Picture,” which uses miniature figures carefully carved from clay to give a deeply personal account of Mr. Panh’s life under the Khmer Rouge as a boy in the 1970s, won the prestigious “un certain regard” prize at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

A member of the Cannes jury that voted on the prize called the film “ferociously non-sentimental but poetic” and said it was “political, highly original, sometimes disturbing, varied, but above all unforgettable.”

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