LONDON, Oct 18 — Despite Bollywood’s popularity worldwide, the mammoth Hindi-language film industry has made barely a dent in the Academy Awards, with just 10 Indian Oscar wins since 1957. Kiran Rao is hoping to change that with “Lost Ladies” — India’s official entry for best international film in 2025 — which she said comes at a “special moment” for South Asian cinema centring women’s stories. Only three Indian entries in the category have been nominated and none has won.
The last entry to be nominated was the 2001 film “Lagaan”. Rao was an assistant director in that epic, while the lead role was played by her ex-husband, Aamir Khan, who was a producer of “Lost Ladies”. “We’ve seen a lot more participation from Asia at the Oscars,” Rao told AFP in London, referring to triumphs for South Korea’s “Parasite” and Malaysian actor Michelle Yeoh’s Best Actress win for “Everything Everywhere All at Once”.
South Asian films, however, “haven’t seen as much in terms of representation at the Oscars”, said Rao. “There’s a lot that we can offer the world in terms of our stories, in terms of our styles.” ‘Change mindsets’ “Lost Ladies” (”Laapataa Ladies” in Hindi) tells the story of two young women in rural India who get mistakenly swapped by their newly wed husbands while wearing similar face-covering veils.
Forging intimate connections and navigating conservative norms with humour, both women and the families they acci.
