Once, in my opinion, was the best film of last year, in no small part due to the amazing music, of which "Falling Slowly" is a prime example. You could have nominated five songs from that film to fill this category and I would have been happy. I'm just glad Once is getting some kind of props at The Show.

FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

• Beaufort
• The Counterfeiters
• Katyn
• Mongol
• 12

Should Win: Mongol

First, let's reflect on some of the more obvious choices and why they're not represented here:

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - Not submitted by France. They opted for Persepolis instead, which was probably a mistake, because...
Persepolis - Not here either. Got picked for Best Animated. Which would have left the door wide open for Diving Bell, had they submitted it.
Lust, Caution - Not "Taiwanese" enough. Don't get me started.
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days - I have no freakin' clue.
Black Book - Not submitted by Germany.
The Host - Okay, this would have been a long shot. But Korea didn't submit it, so we'll never know.

Pretty much any of these films could have knocked out any of the films that actually got nominated, but such is the fickle finger of the selection process. Anyhoo, Beaufort seems to have the most plaudits and domestic box office, if those are any indicator of name recognition, which is about all these flicks will have to go on as I doubt most of the Academy has seen any of them. Also, the plot, revolving around Israeli soldiers in Lebanon circa 2000, is kind of, um, timely.

I have seen none of these films, but I'm going to give it to Mongol just because it's Kazakhstan's first entry to make it to the final five and damn if we didn't give 'em hell last year.

In our next installment: Will there never be an Oscar season without penguins again?