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One of the least-understood and most easily overlooked elements in the Oscar race is the category for Best Foreign Language Film. Although it’s been the object of considerable reporting, discussion and even internal reform by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the field of submissions to the coveted Oscar—this year from no less than 71 countries—is forever a landscape where art, national politics and cultural tendencies sometimes clash and sometimes move in sync. This selection of a portion of the field, a first for the Film Society, proposes a humble means to survey some of the most interesting and distinctive films among this year’s submissions. The collection mixes well-established directors like Baltasar Kormakur and Chen Kaige with rising young filmmakers such as Rodrigo Pla, Aida Begic and Cate Shortland, big-screen epics like Kon-Tiki from Norway and the whimsical Indian comedy Barfi! with the more intimate storytelling of Argentine drama Clandestine Childhood. And who knows? Somewhere in this selection may lie a future Oscar winner! Series programmed by Scott Foundas and Robert Koehler.