Oscar shortlists in ten categories announced

Missing from the list, any film at all from Hong Kong.

There's a bit of kerfuffle about that.

Dec 11

This movie, that "the HK committee" (Federation Of Motion Film Producers of Hong Kong Limited) really wanted to win, was disqualified due to conflict of interest.

Detecting a conflict of interest, AMPAS asked Hong Kong to submit another film, but the invitation was declined.

The weirdness is that the Academy said they've been super transparent about why the film was DQ'd, and they've been communicating about this for a while now, but "the HK committee" made a big fuss in HK on Dec 11 about how they weren't told why etc.

The wiki page for the film STILL incorrectly states this, because it's citing Chinese sources which repeat this "don't know why" non-reason:

It was also selected to represent Hong Kong in the Best International Feature Film category at the 96th Academy Awards, but was later revealed to have been disqualified for currently undisclosed reasons. wiki

According to English sources, "The HK Committee" had a bunch of time to sort it out, they then were told it doesn't work, and THEN they could have submitted another film. Maybe the biggest grossing film of the year, one that "grossed HK$114,293,675 and became the highest-grossing Chinese film in Hong Kong to date" ???

No. They declined to submit ANY film at all rather than submit that one. Why.

(AMPAS is Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences - aka Oscars people)

Then Dec 12,

The committee member / actor of conflict involved then came out the next day to profusely apologise and said i voted for it, and that's why it was DQ'd, so terribly sorry

Which makes no sense at all. AMPAS didn't DQ that one because of a bad vote: there wasn't even any voting at all yet before they were told they need to get someone else without conflict. The HK Committee just had the one guy step forward as scapegoat as to why HK has no film submitted this year.

Maybe you're curious what these two films were about.

The DQ'd film premise from TIFF (wiki) : "Devastated by the loss of her skilled neon sign-making husband, a wife decides to carry on his unfinished dream of making neon signs." -- They have a daughter, but the film is about the boy apprentice and how he "gets" the mom and how much he honours the skill of the father, unlike the daughter who wants to move overseas.

The Not Submitted, highest grossing, film that obviously touched HKers nerve: The Department of Justice is turning a blind eye, kowtowing to the rich and powerful. The protagonist uses his wits, the law, and a steely sense of justice to try to prove his client's innocence, despite personal danger. He doesn't give up fighting even when he knew from the get-go there is no chance in a crooked system.