List of submissions to the 32nd Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
Submissions
Table:
Submitting country
Film title used in nomination
Language(s)
Original title
Director(s)
Result

Denmark
Paw
Danish
Paw
Astrid Henning-Jensen

Nominated

Egypt
The Nightingale's Prayer
Arabic
دعاء الكروان (Doaa al-Karawan)
Henry Barakat

Not Nominated

France
Black Orpheus
Portuguese
Orfeu Negro
Marcel Camus

Won Academy Award

West Germany
The Bridge
German
Die Brücke
Bernhard Wicki

Nominated

Hong Kong
For Better, for Worse
Mandarin
雨過天青 (Yu guo tian qing)
Yueh Feng

Not Nominated

India
The World of Apu
Bengali
অপুর সংসার (Opur Shôngshar)
Satyajit Ray

Not Nominated

Italy
The Great War
Italian
La Grande guerra
Mario Monicelli

Nominated

Japan
Fires on the Plain
Japanese
野火 (Nobi)
Kon Ichikawa

Not Nominated

Mexico
Nazarín
Spanish
Nazarín
Luis Buñuel

Not Nominated

Netherlands
The Village on the River
Dutch
Dorp aan de rivier
Fons Rademakers

Nominated

Pakistan
The Day Shall Dawn
Urdu
Jago Hua Savera
A. J. Kardar

Not Nominated

Singapore
The Kingdom and the Beauty
Mandarin
江山美人 (Jiang shan mei ren)
Li Han-hsiang

Not Nominated

Yugoslavia
Train Without a Timetable
Serbo-Croatian
Vlak bez voznog reda (Влак без возног реда)
Veljko Bulajić

Not Nominated

Consulting the provided table as well as the relevant paragraphs provided at the end.

Solve the question: What is the English title of Denmark 's submission to the 32nd Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film ? Respond with the correct answer (omit explanations) in JSON format as {"answer": "YOUR ANSWER"}. Do not introduce information beyond the provided sources.

Denmark ( Danish : Danmark , pronounced [ ˈtænmak ] ( listen ) ) , officially the Kingdom of Denmark , [ N 10 ] [ N 2 ] is a Nordic country in Northwest Europe . Denmark proper , which is the southernmost of the Scandinavian countries , consists of a peninsula , Jutland , and an archipelago of 443 named islands , [ N 2 ] with the largest being Zealand , Funen and the North Jutlandic Island . The islands are characterised by flat , arable land and sandy coasts , low elevation and a temperate climate . The southernmost of the Scandinavian nations , Denmark lies southwest of Sweden and south of Norway , [ N 11 ] and is bordered to the south by Germany . The Kingdom of Denmark also includes two autonomous territories in the North Atlantic Ocean : the Faroe Islands and Greenland . Denmark has a total area of 42,924 km2 ( 16,573 sq mi ) , land area of 42,394 km2 ( 16,368 sq mi ) , and the total area including Greenland and the Faroe Islands is 2,210,579 km2 ( 853,509 sq mi ) , and a population of 5.8 million in Denmark proper ( Danish egentlige Danmark ) ( as of 2020 [ update ] ) . The unified kingdom of Denmark emerged in the 8th century as a proficient seafaring nation in the struggle for control of the Baltic Sea . Denmark , Sweden , and Norway were ruled together under one sovereign ruler in the Kalmar Union , established in 1397 and ending with Swedish secession in 1523 . The areas of Denmark and Norway remained under the same monarch until 1814 , Denmark-Norway . Beginning in the 17th century , there were several devastating wars with the Swedish Empire , ending with large cessions of territory to Sweden . After the Napoleonic Wars , Norway was ceded to Sweden , while Denmark kept the Faroe Islands , Greenland , and Iceland . In the 19th century there was a surge of nationalist movements , which were defeated in the First Schleswig War .
Paw ( also known as Boy of Two Worlds ) is a 1959 Danish film directed by Astrid Henning-Jensen .
Danish ( /ˈdeɪnɪʃ/ ( listen ) ; dansk pronounced [ ˈtænˀsk ] ( listen ) , dansk sprog [ ˈtænˀsk ˈspʁɔu̯ˀ ] ) is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people , principally in Denmark , Greenland and in the region of Southern Schleswig in northern Germany , where it has minority language status . Also , minor Danish-speaking communities are found in Norway , Sweden , Spain , the United States , Canada , Brazil , and Argentina . Due to immigration and language shift in urban areas , around 15-20% of the population of Greenland speak Danish as their first language . Along with the other North Germanic languages , Danish is a descendant of Old Norse , the common language of the Germanic peoples who lived in Scandinavia during the Viking Era . Danish , together with Swedish , derives from the East Norse dialect group , while the Middle Norwegian language before the influence of Danish and Norwegian Bokmål are classified as West Norse along with Faroese and Icelandic . A more recent classification based on mutual intelligibility separates modern spoken Danish , Norwegian , and Swedish as mainland Scandinavian , while Icelandic and Faroese are classified as insular Scandinavian . Until the 16th century , Danish was a continuum of dialects spoken from Schleswig to Scania with no standard variety or spelling conventions . With the Protestant Reformation and the introduction of printing , a standard language was developed which was based on the educated Copenhagen dialect . It spread through use in the education system and administration , though German and Latin continued to be the most important written languages well into the 17th century . Following the loss of territory to Germany and Sweden , a nationalist movement adopted the language as a token of Danish identity , and the language experienced a strong surge in use and popularity , with major works of literature produced in the 18th and 19th centuries . Today , traditional Danish dialects have all but disappeared , though regional variants of the standard language exist . The main differences in language are between generations , with youth language being particularly innovative .
Astrid Henning-Jensen ( born Astrid Smahl ; 10 December 1914 - 5 January 2002 ) was a Danish film director , actress , editor and screenwriter .
Egypt ( /ˈiːdʒɪpt/ ( listen ) EE-jipt ; Arabic : مِصر Miṣr , Egyptian Arabic : مَصر Maṣr , Coptic : Ⲭⲏⲙⲓ Khēmi ) , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt , is a country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia by a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula . Egypt is a Mediterranean country bordered by the Gaza Strip ( Palestine ) and Israel to the northeast , the Gulf of Aqaba and the Red Sea to the east , Sudan to the south , and Libya to the west . Across the Gulf of Aqaba lies Jordan , across the Red Sea lies Saudi Arabia , and across the Mediterranean lie Greece , Turkey and Cyprus , although none share a land border with Egypt . Egypt has one of the longest histories of any country , tracing its heritage back to the 6th-4th millennia BCE . Considered a cradle of civilisation , Ancient Egypt saw some of the earliest developments of writing , agriculture , urbanisation , organised religion and central government . Iconic monuments such as the Giza Necropolis and its Great Sphinx , as well the ruins of Memphis , Thebes , Karnak , and the Valley of the Kings , reflect this legacy and remain a significant focus of scientific and popular interest . Egypt 's long and rich cultural heritage is an integral part of its national identity , which has endured , and often assimilated , various foreign influences , including Greek , Persian , Roman , Arab , Ottoman Turkish , and Nubian . Egypt was an early and important centre of Christianity , but was largely Islamised in the seventh century and remains a predominantly Muslim country , albeit with a significant Christian minority . From the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century , Egypt was ruled by foreign imperial powers : The Ottoman Empire and the British Empire . Modern Egypt dates back to 1922 , when it gained nominal independence from the British Empire as a monarchy . However , British military occupation of Egypt continued , and many Egyptians believed that the monarchy was an instrument of British colonialism . Following the 1952 revolution , Egypt expelled British soldiers and bureaucrats and ended British occupation , nationalized the British-held Suez Canal , exiled King Farouk and his family , and declared itself a republic .
The Nightingale 's Prayer ( Arabic : دعاء الكروان , translit . Doaa al-Karawan listen ( help·info ) ) is a classical 1959 Egyptian drama film directed by Henry Barakat and based on a novel by the prominent writer Taha Hussein . It stars Faten Hamama and Ahmed Mazhar . In 1996 , during the Egyptian Cinema centennial , this film was selected one of the best 150 Egyptian film productions . It received an award of recognition from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and was selected as the Egyptian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not accepted as a nominee . It was also entered into the 10th Berlin International Film Festival .
Arabic ( Arabic : اَلْعَرَبِيَّةُ , al-ʿarabiyyah , [ al ʕaraˈbijːa ] ( listen ) or عَرَبِيّ , ʿarabīy , [ ˈʕarabiː ] ( listen ) or [ ʕaraˈbij ] ) is a Semitic language that first emerged in the 1st to 4th centuries CE . It is now the lingua franca of the Arab world . It is named after the Arabs , a term initially used to describe peoples living in the area bounded by Mesopotamia in the east and the Anti-Lebanon mountains in the west , in Northwestern Arabia and in the Sinai Peninsula . The ISO assigns language codes to thirty varieties of Arabic , including its standard form , Modern Standard Arabic , also referred to as Literary Arabic , which is modernized Classical Arabic . This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists ; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic , but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā ( اَلعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ , the purest Arabic ) or simply al-fuṣḥā ( اَلْفُصْحَىٰ ) . Arabic is widely taught in schools and universities and is used to varying degrees in workplaces , government and the media . Arabic , in its standard form , is the official language of 26 states , as well as the liturgical language of the religion of Islam , since the Quran and Hadith were written in Arabic . During the Middle Ages , Arabic was a major vehicle of culture in Europe , especially in science , mathematics and philosophy . As a result , many European languages have also borrowed many words from it . Arabic influence , mainly in vocabulary , is seen in European languages - mainly Spanish and to a lesser extent Portuguese and Catalan - owing to both the proximity of Christian European and Muslim Arab civilizations and almost 800 years of Arabic culture and language presence in the Iberian Peninsula , referred to in Arabic as al-Andalus . Sicilian has about 500 Arabic words , many of which relate to agriculture and related activities , [ full citation needed ] as a legacy of the Emirate of Sicily from the mid-9th to mid-10th centuries , while Maltese language is a Semitic language developed from a dialect of Arabic and written in the Latin alphabet . The Balkan languages , including Greek and Bulgarian , have also acquired a significant number of Arabic words through contact with Ottoman Turkish .
Henry Barakat ( Arabic : هنري بركات , 11 June 1914 , Cairo - 27 May 1997 , Cairo ) was a well known Egyptian film director . He was born in Shobra , Cairo , to a Christian Greek Melkite father and a Coptic Orthodox Christian mother . His father was a doctor and received the title of Beik by the King for the services he rendered. , He directed some of the most famous films in the Egyptian Cinema .
France ( French : [ fʁɑ̃s ] ( listen ) ) , officially the French Republic ( French : République française , pronounced [ ʁepyblik fʁɑ̃sɛːz ] ( listen ) ) , is a country whose territory consists of metropolitan France in Western Europe and several overseas regions and territories . [ XIII ] The metropolitan area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea , and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean . It is bordered by Belgium , Luxembourg and Germany to the northeast , Switzerland and Italy to the east , and Andorra and Spain to the south . The overseas territories include French Guiana in South America and several islands in the Atlantic , Pacific and Indian oceans . The country 's 18 integral regions ( five of which are situated overseas ) span a combined area of 643,801 square kilometres ( 248,573 sq mi ) and a total population of 67.02 million ( as of July 2019 [ update ] ) . France is a unitary semi-presidential republic with its capital in Paris , the country 's largest city and main cultural and commercial centre . Other major urban areas include Lyon , Marseille , Toulouse , Bordeaux , Lille and Nice . France , including its overseas territories , has the most number of time zones of any country , with a total of 12 . During the Iron Age , what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls , a Celtic people . Rome annexed the area in 51 BC , holding it until the arrival of Germanic Franks in 476 , who formed the Kingdom of Francia . The Treaty of Verdun of 843 partitioned Francia into East Francia , Middle Francia and West Francia . West Francia , which became the Kingdom of France in 987 , emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages , following its victory in the Hundred Years ' War ( 1337-1453 ) .
Black Orpheus ( Portuguese : Orfeu Negro [ ɔɾˈfew ˈne.ɡɾu ] ) is a 1959 romantic tragedy film made in Brazil by French director Marcel Camus and starring Marpessa Dawn and Breno Mello . It is based on the play Orfeu da Conceição by Vinicius de Moraes , which is itself an adaptation of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice , set in the modern context of a favela ( slum ) in Rio de Janeiro during Carnaval . The film was an international co-production among production companies in Brazil , France and Italy . The film is particularly noted for its soundtrack by two Brazilian composers : Antônio Carlos Jobim , whose song A Felicidade opens the film ; and Luiz Bonfá , whose Manhã de Carnaval and Samba de Orfeu have become classics of bossa nova . The songs sung by the character Orfeu were dubbed by singer Agostinho dos Santos . Lengthy passages of the film were shot in the Morro da Babilônia , a favela in the Leme neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro .
Portuguese ( português or , in full , língua portuguesa ) is a Western Romance language originating in the Iberian Peninsula . It is the sole official language of Portugal , Brazil , Cape Verde , Guinea-Bissau , Mozambique , Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe . It also has co-official language status in East Timor , Equatorial Guinea and Chinese Macau . As the result of expansion during colonial times , a cultural presence of Portuguese and Portuguese creole speakers are also found in Goa , Daman and Diu in India ; in Batticaloa on the east coast of Sri Lanka ; in the Indonesian island of Flores ; in the Malacca state of Malaysia ; and the ABC islands in the Caribbean where Papiamento is spoken , while Cape Verdean Creole is the most widely spoken Portuguese-based Creole . A Portuguese-speaking person or nation is referred to as Lusophone ( Lusófono ) . Portuguese is part of the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia and the County of Portugal , and has kept some Celtic phonology and lexicon . With approximately 215 to 220 million native speakers and 250 million total speakers , Portuguese is usually listed as the sixth most natively spoken language in the world , the third-most spoken European language in the world in terms of native speakers , and the most spoken language in the Southern Hemisphere . It is also the second-most spoken language , after Spanish , in South America and all of Latin America , one of the 10 most spoken languages in Africa and is an official language of the European Union , Mercosur , OAS , ECOWAS and the African Union . The Community of Portuguese Language Countries is an international organization made up of all of the world 's officially Lusophone nations .
Marcel Camus ( 21 April 1912 - 13 January 1982 ) was a French film director . He is best known for Orfeu Negro ( Black Orpheus ) , which won the Palme d'Or at the 1959 Cannes Film Festival and the 1960 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film .
West Germany was the informal name for the Federal Republic of Germany , a country in Western Europe , in the period between its formation on 23 May 1949 and German reunification on 3 October 1990 . During this Cold War period , the western portion of Germany was part of the Western Bloc . The Federal Republic was created during the Allied occupation of Germany after World War II , established from eleven states formed in the three Allied zones of occupation held by the United States , the United Kingdom and France . Its ( provisional ) capital was the city of Bonn . The Cold War era West Germany is also retrospectively designated the Bonn Republic . At the onset of the Cold War , Europe was divided among the Western and Eastern blocs . Germany was de facto divided into two countries and two special territories , the Saarland and a divided Berlin . Initially , the Federal Republic of Germany claimed an exclusive mandate for all of Germany , considering itself to be the sole democratically reorganised continuation of the 1871-1945 German Reich . It took the line that the German Democratic Republic ( GDR ) was an illegally constituted puppet state . Though the GDR did hold regular elections , these were neither free nor fair . From the West German perspective , the GDR was therefore illegitimate . Three southwestern states of West Germany merged to form Baden-Württemberg in 1952 , and the Saarland joined the Federal Republic of Germany in 1957 .
Die Brücke ( The Bridge ) is a 1959 West German film directed by Austrian filmmaker Bernhard Wicki . It is based on the 1958 novel of the same name by journalist and writer Gregor Dorfmeister ( published under the pseudonym Manfred Gregor ) . The story was based on an actual event , upon the personal report of a surviving veteran who in his own youth experienced a similar situation in World War II . The film was timely in West Germany as the Bundeswehr had only recently been created in 1955 with conscription in Germany beginning in 1956 . It received several international prizes , notably the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film and the National Board of Review Award for Best Foreign Language Film , also a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film .
German ( Deutsch , pronounced [ dɔʏtʃ ] ( listen ) ) is a West Germanic language that is mainly spoken in Central Europe . It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany , Austria , Switzerland , South Tyrol in Italy , the German-speaking Community of Belgium and Liechtenstein . It is one of the three official languages of Luxembourg and a co-official language in the Opole Voivodeship in Poland . The languages that are most similar to German are the other members of the West Germanic language branch , including Afrikaans , Dutch , English , the Frisian languages , Low German/Low Saxon , Luxembourgish , and Yiddish . There are strong similarities in vocabulary with Danish , Norwegian and Swedish , although those belong to the North Germanic group . German is the second most widely spoken Germanic language , after English . One of the major languages of the world , German is a native language to almost 100 million people worldwide and the most widely spoken native language in the European Union . German is the third most commonly spoken foreign language in the EU after English and French , making it the second biggest language in the EU in terms of overall speakers . German is also the second most widely taught foreign language in the EU after English at primary school level ( but third after English and French at lower secondary level ) , the fourth most widely taught non-English language in the US ( after Spanish , French and American Sign Language ) , and the second most commonly used scientific language as well as the third most widely used language on websites after English and Russian . The German-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books , with one tenth of all books ( including e-books ) in the world being published in the German language . In the United Kingdom , German and French are the most sought-after foreign languages for businesses ( with 49% and 50% of businesses identifying these two languages as the most useful , respectively ) . German is an inflected language with four cases for nouns , pronouns and adjectives ( nominative , accusative , genitive , dative ) , three genders ( masculine , feminine , neuter ) , two numbers ( singular , plural ) , and strong and weak verbs .
Bernhard Wicki ( 28 October 1919 - 3 January 2000 ) was an Austrian actor and film director .
Hong Kong ( /ˌhɒŋˈkɒŋ/ ( listen ) ; Chinese : 香港 , Cantonese : [ hœ́ːŋ.kɔ̌ːŋ ] ( listen ) ) , officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People 's Republic of China ( HKSAR ) , is a city and special administrative region on the eastern side of the Pearl River estuary in southern China . With over 7.4 million people of various nationalities [ d ] in a 1,104-square-kilometre ( 426 sq mi ) territory , Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated places in the world . Hong Kong became a colony of the British Empire after Qing Empire ceded Hong Kong Island at the end of the First Opium War in 1842 . The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 after the Second Opium War , and was further extended when Britain obtained a 99-year lease of the New Territories in 1898 . The territory was returned to China in 1997 . As a special administrative region , Hong Kong maintains separate governing and economic systems from that of mainland China under the principle of one country , two systems . Originally a sparsely populated area of farming and fishing villages , the territory has become one of the world 's most significant financial centres and commercial ports . It is the world 's tenth-largest exporter and ninth-largest importer . As one of the world 's leading international financial centres , Hong Kong has a major capitalist service economy characterised by low taxation and free trade , and the currency , Hong Kong dollar , is the eighth most traded currency in the world . Hong Kong hosts the largest concentration of ultra high-net-worth individuals of any city in the world . Although the city has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world , there is severe income inequality among its residents . Hong Kong is a highly developed territory and ranks fourth on the UN Human Development Index .
For Better , for Worse ( Chinese : 雨過天青 ; pinyin : Yu guo tian qing ) is a 1959 Hong Kong drama film written and directed by Yueh Feng . The film was selected as the Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not accepted as a nominee .
Mandarin ( /ˈmændərɪn/ ( listen ) ; simplified Chinese : 官话 ; traditional Chinese : 官話 ; pinyin : Guānhuà ; literally : 'speech of officials ' ) is a group of related Sinitic languages spoken across most of northern and southwestern China . The group includes the Beijing dialect , the basis of Standard Chinese or Standard Mandarin . Because Mandarin originated in North China and most Mandarin dialects are found in the north , the group is sometimes referred to as the Northern dialects ( 北方话 ; běifānghuà ) . Many local Mandarin varieties are not mutually intelligible . Nevertheless , Mandarin is often placed first in lists of languages by number of native speakers ( with nearly a billion ) . Mandarin is by far the largest of the seven or ten Chinese dialect groups , spoken by 70 percent of all Chinese speakers over a large geographical area , stretching from Yunnan in the southwest to Xinjiang in the northwest and Heilongjiang in the northeast . This is generally attributed to the greater ease of travel and communication in the North China Plain compared to the more mountainous south , combined with the relatively recent spread of Mandarin to frontier areas . Most Mandarin varieties have four tones . The final stops of Middle Chinese have disappeared in most of these varieties , but some have merged them as a final glottal stop . Many Mandarin varieties , including the Beijing dialect , retain retroflex initial consonants , which have been lost in southern varieties of Chinese . The capital has been within the Mandarin area for most of the last millennium , making these dialects very influential . Some form of Mandarin has served as a national lingua franca since the 14th century .
Griffin Yueh Feng ( Chinese : 岳枫 ; pinyin : Yuè Fēng ; 1909 or July 29 , 1910 - March 3 , 1999 ) was a Chinese film director and screenwriter who worked in the Cinema of Hong Kong . He worked at the Shaw Brothers Studio 's for many years and directed nearly 90 films .
India ( Hindi : Bhārat ) , officially the Republic of India ( Hindi : Bhārat Gaṇarājya ) , is a country in South Asia . It is the seventh-largest country by area , the second-most populous country , and the most populous democracy in the world . Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south , the Arabian Sea on the southwest , and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast , it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west ; [ e ] China , Nepal , and Bhutan to the north ; and Bangladesh and Myanmar to the east . In the Indian Ocean , India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives ; its Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia . Modern humans arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa no later than 55,000 years ago . Their long occupation , initially in varying forms of isolation as hunter-gatherers , has made the region highly diverse , second only to Africa in human genetic diversity . Settled life emerged on the subcontinent in the western margins of the Indus river basin 9,000 years ago , evolving gradually into the Indus Valley Civilisation of the third millennium BCE . By 1200 BCE , an archaic form of Sanskrit , an Indo-European language , had diffused into India from the northwest , unfolding as the language of the Rigveda , and recording the dawning of Hinduism in India . The Dravidian languages of India were supplanted in the northern regions . By 400 BCE , stratification and exclusion by caste had emerged within Hinduism , and Buddhism and Jainism had arisen , proclaiming social orders unlinked to heredity . Early political consolidations gave rise to the loose-knit Maurya and Gupta Empires based in the Ganges Basin . Their collective era was suffused with wide-ranging creativity , but also marked by the declining status of women , and the incorporation of untouchability into an organised system of belief .
The World of Apu ( Bengali : অপুর সংসার Apura sansāra ; Apur Sansar ) is a 1959 Indian Bengali drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray . It is the third part of The Apu Trilogy , about the childhood and early adulthood of a young Bengali named Apu in the early twentieth century Indian subcontinent . ( The first two parts of the trilogy are Pather Panchali and Aparajito . ) The film is based on the last two-thirds of the 1932 Bengali novel , Aparajito , by Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay . Released in 1959 , The World of Apu focuses on Apu 's adult life , and also introduces the actors Soumitra Chatterjee and Sharmila Tagore , who would go on to appear in many subsequent Ray films . The film won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film and several international awards , including the Sutherland Award for Best Original And Imaginative Film and National Board of Review Award for Best Foreign Language Film . The World of Apu has been influential across the world and is frequently listed among the greatest films of all time .
Bengali ( /bɛŋˈɡɔːli/ ) , also known by its endonym Bangla ( বাংলা [ ˈbaŋla ] ) , is an Indo-Aryan language primarily spoken by the Bengalis in South Asia , specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent , presently divided between Bangladesh and the Indian states of West Bengal , Tripura , Assam 's Barak Valley . It is the official and most widely spoken language of Bangladesh and second most widely spoken of the 22 scheduled languages of India , behind Hindi . With approximately 228 million native speakers and another 37 million as second language speakers , Bengali is the fifth most-spoken native language and the seventh most spoken language by total number of speakers in the world . The official and de facto national language of Bangladesh is Modern Standard Bengali ( Literary Bengali ) . It serves as the lingua franca of the nation , with 98% of Bangladeshis being fluent in Bengali as their first language . Within India , Bengali is the official language of the states of West Bengal , Tripura and the Barak Valley region of the state of Assam . It is the most widely spoken language in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal , and is spoken by significant populations in other states including in Arunachal Pradesh , Delhi , Chhattisgarh , Jharkhand , Meghalaya , Mizoram , Nagaland and Uttarakhand . Bengali is also spoken by the significant global Bengali diaspora ( Bangladeshi diaspora and Indian Bengalis ) communities in Pakistan , the United Kingdom , the United States , and the Middle East . Bengali has developed over the course of more than 1,300 years . Bengali literature , with its millennium-old literary history , has extensively developed since the Bengali Renaissance and is one of the most prolific and diverse literary traditions in Asia . The Bengali language movement from 1948 to 1956 demanding Bengali to be an official language of Pakistan fostered Bengali nationalism in East Bengal leading to the emergence of Bangladesh in 1971 . In 1999 , UNESCO recognised 21 February as International Mother Language Day in recognition of the language movement .
Satyajit Ray ( Bengali pronunciation : [ ˈʃɔtːodʒit ˈrai̯ ] ( listen ) ; 2 May 1921 - 23 April 1992 ) was an Indian filmmaker , screenwriter , music composer , graphic artist , lyricist and author , widely regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time . Ray was born in Calcutta into a Bengali family which was prominent in the field of arts and literature . Starting his career as a commercial artist , Ray was drawn into independent filmmaking after meeting French filmmaker Jean Renoir and viewing Vittorio De Sica 's Italian neorealist film Bicycle Thieves ( 1948 ) during a visit to London . Ray directed 36 films , including feature films , documentaries and shorts . He was also a fiction writer , publisher , illustrator , calligrapher , music composer , graphic designer and film critic . He authored several short stories and novels , meant primarily for young children and teenagers . Feluda , the sleuth , and Professor Shonku , the scientist in his science fiction stories , are popular fictional characters created by him . He was awarded an honorary degree by Oxford University . Ray 's first film , Pather Panchali ( 1955 ) , won eleven international prizes , including the inaugural Best Human Document award at the 1956 Cannes Film Festival . This film , along with Aparajito ( 1956 ) and Apur Sansar ( The World of Apu ) ( 1959 ) , form The Apu Trilogy . Ray did the scripting , casting , scoring , and editing , and designed his own credit titles and publicity material . Ray received many major awards in his career , including 32 Indian National Film Awards , a Golden Lion , a Golden Bear , 2 Silver Bears , a number of additional awards at international film festivals and award ceremonies , and an Academy Honorary Award in 1992 .
Italy ( Italian : Italia [ iˈtaːlja ] ( listen ) ) , officially the Italian Republic ( Italian : Repubblica Italiana [ reˈpubblika itaˈljaːna ] ) , is a European country consisting of a peninsula delimited by the Alps and surrounded by several islands . Italy is located in south-central Europe , and it is also considered a part of Western Europe . The country covers a total area of 301,340 km2 ( 116,350 sq mi ) and shares land borders with France , Switzerland , Austria , Slovenia , and the enclaved microstates of Vatican City and San Marino . Italy has a territorial exclave in Switzerland ( Campione ) and a maritime exclave in the Tunisian Sea ( Lampedusa ) . With around 60 million inhabitants , Italy is the third-most populous member state of the European Union . The capital and largest city is Rome ; other major cities are Milan , Naples , Turin , Palermo , Genoa , Bologna , Florence and Venice . Due to its central geographic location in Southern Europe and the Mediterranean , Italy has historically been home to myriad peoples and cultures . In addition to the various ancient peoples dispersed throughout what is now modern-day Italy , the most predominant being the Indo-European Italic peoples who gave the peninsula its name , beginning from the classical era , Phoenicians and Carthaginians founded colonies mostly in insular Italy , Greeks established settlements in the so-called Magna Graecia of Southern Italy , while Etruscans and Celts inhabited central and northern Italy respectively . An Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom in the 8th century BC , which eventually became a republic with a government of the Senate and the People . The Roman Republic initially conquered and assimilated its neighbours on the Italian peninsula , eventually expanding and conquering parts of Europe , North Africa and Asia . By the first century BC , the Roman Empire emerged as the dominant power in the Mediterranean Basin and became a leading cultural , political and religious centre , inaugurating the Pax Romana , a period of more than 200 years during which Italy 's law , technology , economy , art , and literature developed . Italy remained the homeland of the Romans and the metropole of the empire , whose legacy can also be observed in the global distribution of culture , governments , Christianity and the Latin script .
The Great War ( Italian : La grande guerra ) is a 1959 Italian comedy-drama war film directed by Mario Monicelli . It tells the story of an odd couple of army buddies in World War I ; the movie , while played on a comedic register , does not hide from the viewer the horrors and grimness of trench warfare . Starring Alberto Sordi and Vittorio Gassman and produced by Dino De Laurentiis , the film won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival . Its crew also included Danilo Donati ( costumes ) and Mario Garbuglia ( set designer ) . It was an Academy Award nominee as Best Foreign Film . In 1999 the critics of Ciak magazine chose it as one of the 100 most important films in history , and was selected to enter the list of the 100 Italian films to be saved . It won huge success outside Italy , especially in France .
Italian ( italiano [ itaˈljaːno ] ( listen ) or lingua italiana [ ˈliŋɡwa itaˈljaːna ] ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family . Italian descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire and , together with Sardinian , is by most measures the closest language to it of the Romance languages . Italian is an official language in Italy , Switzerland ( where it is the first language in Canton Ticino and in the districts of Moesa and Bernina in Canton Graubünden ) , San Marino and Vatican City . It has an official minority status in western Istria ( Croatia and Slovenia ) . It formerly had official status in Albania , Malta , Monaco , Montenegro ( Kotor ) and Greece ( Ionian Islands and Dodecanese ) , and is generally understood in Corsica ( due to its close relation with the Tuscan-influenced local language ) and Savoie . It also used to be an official language in the former Italian East Africa and Italian North Africa , where it still plays a significant role in various sectors . Italian is also spoken by large expatriate communities in the Americas and Australia . Italian is included under the languages covered by the European Charter for Regional or Minority languages in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Romania , although Italian is neither a co-official nor a protected language in these countries . Many speakers of Italian are native bilinguals of both Italian ( either in its standard form or regional varieties ) and other regional languages . Italian is a major European language , being one of the official languages of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and one of the working languages of the Council of Europe . It is the fourth most widely spoken first language in the European Union with 69 million native speakers ( 13% of the EU population ) and it is spoken as a second language by 16 million EU citizens ( 3% ) . Including Italian speakers in non-EU European countries ( such as Switzerland and Albania ) and on other continents , the total number of speakers is around 90 million .
Mario Monicelli ( Italian : [ ˈmaːrjo moniˈtʃɛlli ] ; 16 May 1915 - 29 November 2010 ) was an Italian director and screenwriter and one of the masters of the Commedia all'Italiana ( Comedy Italian style ) . He was nominated six times for an Oscar .
Japan ( Japanese : 日本 , Nippon [ ɲippoꜜɴ ] ( listen ) or Nihon [ ɲihoꜜɴ ] ( listen ) ) is an island country located in East Asia . It is bordered by the Sea of Japan to the west and the Pacific Ocean to the east , and spans more than 3,000 kilometers ( 1,900 mi ) along the coast of the continent from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Philippine Sea in the south . Part of the Pacific Ring of Fire , Japan encompasses a stratovolcanic archipelago of about 6,852 islands , with five main islands ( Hokkaido , Honshu , Kyushu , Shikoku , and Okinawa ) comprising 97% of the country 's total area of 377,975 square kilometers ( 145,937 sq mi ) . Japan is officially divided into 47 prefectures and traditionally into eight regions . Approximately two-thirds of the country 's terrain is mountainous and heavily forested , and less than one-eighth of land is suitable for agriculture . Consequently , Japan is among the most densely populated and urbanized countries in the world , with over 90% of its population living in urban areas . The largest of these is the metropolitan area centered on the capital city of Tokyo , which is the most populous in the world and home to more than 38 million people . Japan itself is the world 's eleventh most populous country with a population of 126.2 million , of which 97.8% are ethnically Japanese . The kanji ( or Chinese characters ) that make up the name of Japan in the Japanese language mean sun origin ; in the Western world , the country is often known by the sobriquet Land of the Rising Sun . Periods of influence from other regions , primarily China , followed by periods of isolation , particularly from Western Europe , have characterized the history of Japan . While archaeological evidence indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period , the first written mention of the archipelago appears in Chinese texts from the first century AD . Between the fourth and ninth centuries , the kingdoms of Japan became gradually unified under an Emperor and imperial court based in Heian-kyō ( modern Kyoto ) .
Fires on the Plain ( 野火 , Nobi ) is a 1959 Japanese war film directed by Kon Ichikawa , starring Eiji Funakoshi . The screenplay , written by Natto Wada , is based on the novel Nobi ( Tokyo 1951 ) by Shōhei Ōoka , translated as Fires on the Plain . It initially received mixed reviews from both Japanese and international critics concerning its violence and bleak theme . In following decades , however , it has become highly regarded . Fires on the Plain follows a tubercular Japanese private and his attempt to stay alive during the latter part of World War II . Kon Ichikawa has noted its thematic struggle between staying alive , and crossing the ultimate low .
Japanese ( 日本語 , Nihongo [ ɲihoŋɡo ] ( listen ) ) is an East Asian language spoken by about 128 million people , primarily in Japan , where it is the national language . It is a member of the Japonic ( or Japanese-Ryukyuan ) language family , and its relation to other languages , such as Korean , is debated . Japanese has been grouped with language families such as Ainu , Austroasiatic , and the now-discredited Altaic , but none of these proposals has gained widespread acceptance . Little is known of the language 's prehistory , or when it first appeared in Japan . Chinese documents from the 3rd century recorded a few Japanese words , but substantial texts did not appear until the 8th century . During the Heian period ( 794-1185 ) , Chinese had considerable influence on the vocabulary and phonology of Old Japanese . Late Middle Japanese ( 1185-1600 ) included changes in features that brought it closer to the modern language , and the first appearance of European loanwords . The standard dialect moved from the Kansai region to the Edo ( modern Tokyo ) region in the Early Modern Japanese period ( early 17th century-mid-19th century ) . Following the end of Japan 's self-imposed isolation in 1853 , the flow of loanwords from European languages increased significantly . English loanwords , in particular , have become frequent , and Japanese words from English roots have proliferated . Japanese is an agglutinative , mora-timed language with simple phonotactics , a pure vowel system , phonemic vowel and consonant length , and a lexically significant pitch-accent . Word order is normally subject-object-verb with particles marking the grammatical function of words , and sentence structure is topic-comment .
Kon Ichikawa ( 市川 崑 , Ichikawa Kon , 20 November 1915 - 13 February 2008 ) was a Japanese film director .
Mexico ( Spanish : México [ ˈmexiko ] ( listen ) ; Nahuatl languages : Mēxihco ) , officially the United Mexican States ( UMS ; Spanish : Estados Unidos Mexicanos , EUM [ esˈtaðos uˈniðoz mexiˈkanos ] ( listen ) , lit . Mexican United States ) , is a country in the southern portion of North America . It is bordered to the north by the United States ; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean ; to the southeast by Guatemala , Belize , and the Caribbean Sea ; and to the east by the Gulf of Mexico . Covering almost 2,000,000 square kilometers ( 770,000 sq mi ) , the nation is the fifth largest country in the Americas by total area and the 13th largest independent state in the world . With an estimated population of over 129 million people , Mexico is the tenth most populous country and the most populous Spanish-speaking country in the world , while being the second most populous nation in Latin America after Brazil . Mexico is a federation comprising 31 states plus Mexico City ( CDMX ) , which is the capital city and its most populous city . Other metropolises in the country include Guadalajara , Monterrey , Puebla , Toluca , Tijuana , and León . Pre-Columbian Mexico dates to about 8000 BC and is identified as one of six cradles of civilization and was home to many advanced Mesoamerican civilizations such as the Olmec , Toltec , Teotihuacan , Zapotec , Maya , and Aztec before first contact with Europeans . In 1521 , the Spanish Empire conquered and colonized the territory from its politically powerful base in Mexico-Tenochtitlan ( part of Mexico City ) , which was administered as the viceroyalty of New Spain . The Roman Catholic Church played a powerful role in governing the country as millions were converted to the faith , although King Charles III expelled the Jesuits in the 1770s . The territory became a nation state following its recognition in 1821 after the Mexican War of Independence . The post-independence period was tumultuous , characterized by economic inequality and many contrasting political changes .
Nazarín ( Spanish pronunciation : [ nasaˈɾin ] , [ naθaˈɾin ] ) is a 1959 Mexican film directed by Luis Buñuel and co-written between Buñuel and Julio Alejandro , adapted from the eponymous novel of Benito Pérez Galdós . It won the international prize at the 1959 Cannes Film Festival and was selected as the Mexican entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not selected as a nominee . Although Nazarín is not one of Buñuel 's most renowned films , it still holds a high reputation . Andrei Tarkovsky named it one of his 10 favorite films . In April 2019 , a restored version of the film was selected to be shown in the Cannes Classics section at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival .
Spanish ( /ˈspænɪʃ/ ( listen ) ; español ( help·info ) ) , or Castilian ( /kæˈstɪliən/ ( listen ) , castellano ( help·info ) ) , is a Romance language that originated in the Iberian Peninsula and today has over 483 million native speakers , mainly in Spain and the Americas . It is a global language , the world 's second-most spoken native language , after Mandarin Chinese , and the world 's fourth-most spoken language , after Mandarin Chinese , English and Hindi . Spanish is a part of the Ibero-Romance group of languages , which evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in Iberia after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century . The oldest Latin texts with traces of Spanish come from mid-northern Iberia in the 9th century , and the first systematic written use of the language happened in Toledo , a prominent city of the Kingdom of Castile , in the 13th century . Beginning in 1492 , the Spanish language was taken to the viceroyalties of the Spanish Empire , most notably to the Americas , as well as territories in Africa , Oceania and the Philippines . A 1949 study by Italian-American linguist Mario Pei , analyzing the degree of difference from a language 's parent ( Latin , in the case of Romance languages ) by comparing phonology , inflection , syntax , vocabulary , and intonation , indicated the following percentages ( the higher the percentage , the greater the distance from Latin ) : In the case of Spanish , it is one of the closest Romance languages to Latin ( 20% distance ) , only behind Sardinian ( 8% distance ) and Italian ( 12% distance ) . Around 75% of modern Spanish vocabulary is derived from Latin , including Latin borrowings from Ancient Greek . Spanish vocabulary has been in contact with Arabic from an early date , having developed during the Al-Andalus era in the Iberian Peninsula . With around 8% of its vocabulary being Arabic in origin , this language makes up the second greatest vocabulary source after Latin itself . It has also been influenced by Basque , Iberian , Celtiberian , Visigothic , and by neighboring Ibero-Romance languages . Additionally , it has absorbed vocabulary from other languages , particularly other Romance languages - French , Italian , Andalusi Romance , Portuguese , Galician , Catalan , Occitan , and Sardinian - as well as from Quechua , Nahuatl , and other indigenous languages of the Americas . Spanish is one of the six official languages of the United Nations .
Luis Buñuel Portolés ( Spanish pronunciation : [ ˈlwis βuˈɲwel poɾtoˈles ] ; 22 February 1900 - 29 July 1983 ) was a Spanish filmmaker , naturalised Mexican in 1949 , who worked in France , Mexico and Spain . When Buñuel died at age 83 , his obituary in The New York Times called him an iconoclast , moralist , and revolutionary who was a leader of avant-garde surrealism in his youth and a dominant international movie director half a century later . His first picture , Un Chien Andalou - made in the silent era - was called the most famous short film ever made by critic Roger Ebert , and his last film , That Obscure Object of Desire - made 48 years later - won him Best Director awards from the National Board of Review and the National Society of Film Critics . Writer Octavio Paz called Buñuel 's work the marriage of the film image to the poetic image , creating a new reality.scandalous and subversive . Often associated with the surrealist movement of the 1920s , Buñuel created films from the 1920s through the 1970s . His work spans two continents , three languages , and an array of genres , including experimental film , documentary , melodrama , satire , musical , erotica , comedy , romance , costume dramas , fantasy , crime film , adventure , and western . Despite this variety , filmmaker John Huston believed that , regardless of genre , a Buñuel film is so distinctive as to be instantly recognizable , or , as Ingmar Bergman put it , Buñuel nearly always made Buñuel films . Seven of Buñuel 's films are included in Sight & Sound 's 2012 critics ' poll of the top 250 films of all time . Fifteen of his films are included in the They Shoot Pictures , Do n't They ? list of the 1,000 greatest films of all time , for which he ranks second only to Jean-Luc Godard , with sixteen , and he ranks number 13 on their list of the top 250 directors .
The Netherlands ( Dutch : Nederland , [ ˈneːdərlɑnt ] ( listen ) ) , informally Holland , is a country in Northwestern Europe with some overseas territories in the Caribbean . In Europe , it consists of 12 provinces that border Germany to the east , Belgium to the south , and the North Sea to the northwest , with maritime borders in the North Sea with those countries and the United Kingdom . Together with the Caribbean Netherlands - Bonaire , Sint Eustatius and Saba - it forms a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands . The official language is Dutch and a secondary official language in the province of Friesland is West Frisian . In the north and east of the country , Low Saxon is also spoken , and in the southeast , Limburgish . In the Caribbean Netherlands English and Papiamento are recognised languages . The five largest cities in the Netherlands are Amsterdam , Rotterdam , The Hague , Utrecht and Eindhoven . Amsterdam is the country 's most populous city and nominal capital , while The Hague holds the seat of the States General , Cabinet and Supreme Court . The Port of Rotterdam is the busiest seaport in Europe , and the busiest in any country outside Asia . Amsterdam Airport Schiphol is the busiest airport in the Netherlands , and the third busiest in Europe . The country is a founding member of the EU , Eurozone , G10 , NATO , OECD and WTO , as well as a part of the Schengen Area and the trilateral Benelux Union . It hosts several intergovernmental organisations and international courts , many of which are centered in The Hague , which is consequently dubbed 'the world 's legal capital ' .
Village by the River ( Dutch : Dorp aan de rivier ) is a 1958 Dutch film directed by Fons Rademakers . The film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards .
Dutch ( Nederlands ( help·info ) ) is a West Germanic language spoken by around 24 million people as a first language and 5 million people as a second language , constituting the majority of people in the Netherlands ( where it is the sole official language countrywide ) and Belgium ( as one of three official languages ) . It is the third-most-widely spoken Germanic language , after its close relatives English and German . Outside the Low Countries , it is the native language of the majority of the population of Suriname where it also holds an official status , as it does in Aruba , Curaçao and Sint Maarten , which are constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands located in the Caribbean . Historical linguistic minorities on the verge of extinction remain in parts of France and Germany , and in Indonesia , [ n 1 ] while up to half a million native speakers may reside in the United States , Canada and Australia combined . [ n 2 ] The Cape Dutch dialects of Southern Africa have evolved into Afrikaans , a mutually intelligible daughter language [ n 3 ] which is spoken to some degree by at least 16 million people , mainly in South Africa and Namibia . [ n 4 ] Dutch is one of the closest relatives of both German and English [ n 5 ] and is colloquially said to be roughly in between them . [ n 6 ] Dutch , like English , has not undergone the High German consonant shift , does not use Germanic umlaut as a grammatical marker , has largely abandoned the use of the subjunctive , and has levelled much of its morphology , including most of its case system . [ n 7 ] Features shared with German include the survival of two to three grammatical genders - albeit with few grammatical consequences [ n 8 ] - as well as the use of modal particles , final-obstruent devoicing , and a similar word order . [ n 9 ] Dutch vocabulary is mostly Germanic and incorporates slightly more Romance loans than German but far fewer than English . [ n 10 ] As with German , the vocabulary of Dutch also has strong similarities with the continental Scandinavian languages , but is not mutually intelligible in text or speech with any of them .
Alphonse Marie Fons Rademakers ( 5 September 1920 - 22 February 2007 ) was a Dutch actor , film director , film producer and screenwriter . His 1960 film Makkers Staakt uw Wild Geraas was entered into the 11th Berlin International Film Festival , where it won the Silver Bear Award . During a career spanning several decades he directed 11 films , including The Assault , which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1986 , and The Village on the River , nominated for the same award in 1959 . Making him both the first Dutch director to be nominated and win this award . He granted a wide-ranging interview to Radio Netherlands in 1987 . He died in 2007 in a Geneva hospital of emphysema , after the life-support machines were switched off at his request .
Pakistan , [ b ] officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan , [ c ] is a country in South Asia . It is the world 's sixth-most populous country with a population exceeding 207.8 million . In area , it is the 33rd-largest country , spanning 881,913 square kilometres ( 340,509 square miles ) . Pakistan has a 1,046-kilometre ( 650-mile ) coastline along the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by India to the east , Afghanistan to the west , Iran to the southwest , and China in the northeast . It is separated narrowly from Tajikistan by Afghanistan 's Wakhan Corridor in the northwest , and also shares a maritime border with Oman . The territory that now constitutes Pakistan was the site of several ancient cultures and intertwined with the history of the broader Indian subcontinent . The ancient history involves the Neolithic site of Mehrgarh and the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilisation , and was later home to kingdoms ruled by people of different faiths and cultures , including Hindus , Indo-Greeks , Muslims , Turco-Mongols , Afghans and Sikhs . The area has been ruled by numerous empires and dynasties , including the Persian Achaemenid Empire , Alexander III of Macedon , the Seleucid Empire , the Indian Maurya Empire , the Gupta Empire , the Arab Umayyad Caliphate , the Delhi Sultanate , the Mongol Empire , the Mughal Empire , the Afghan Durrani Empire , the Sikh Empire ( partially ) and , most recently , the British Indian Empire . Pakistan is the only country to have been created in the name of Islam . It is an ethnically and linguistically diverse country , with similarly diverse geography and wildlife . Initially a dominion , Pakistan adopted a constitution in 1956 , becoming an Islamic republic . An ethnic civil war and Indian military intervention in 1971 resulted in the secession of East Pakistan as the new country of Bangladesh .
The Day Shall Dawn ( Urdu : جاگو ہوا سویرا , Jago Hua Savera ) is a 1959 Pakistani drama film directed by A. J. Kardar . The film was selected as the Pakistani entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not accepted as a nominee . It was also entered into the 1st Moscow International Film Festival where it won a Golden Medal .
Urdu ( /ˈʊərduː/ ; Urdu : اُردُو , ALA-LC : Urdū , [ ˈʊrduː ] ( listen ) ) - also known as Lashkari ( لشکری , Laškarī , [ ləʃkəri : ] ) - or Modern Standard Urdu is a Persianised standard register of the Hindustani language . Urdu is the official national language , and lingua franca , of Pakistan . In India , it is one of 22 constitutionally recognised official languages , having official status in the five states of Telangana , Uttar Pradesh , Bihar , Jharkhand and West Bengal , as well as the national capital territory of Delhi . As both registers are composed of the same Indo-Aryan vocabulary base , colloquial Urdu is largely mutually intelligible with colloquial Hindi , with the two registers being grouped together as Hindustani or Hindi-Urdu . With respect to literary vocabulary , however , formal Urdu draws heavily from Persian vocabulary and requires knowledge of some simple Persian grammatical structures , while formal Hindi heavily draws from Sanskrit for its formal and technical vocabulary . Later , Urdu became the official language of government in northern and northwest British India , along with English , from 1837 onwards in place of Persian , which had been used by various Indo-Islamic empires as their language of government . Religious , social , and political factors arose during the colonial period that advocated for a distinction between Urdu and Hindi , leading to the Hindi-Urdu controversy . According to Nationalencyklopedin 's 2010 estimates , Urdu is the 21st most spoken first language in the world , with approximately 66 million who speak it as their native language . According to Ethnologue 's 2018 estimates , Urdu , is the 11th most widely spoken language in the world , with 170 million total speakers , including those who speak it as a second language . If grouped along with Hindi , Hindustani would be the 3rd most spoken language in the world , with approximately 329.1 million native speakers , and 697.4 million total speakers of both Urdu and Hindi .
Akhtar J. Kardar ( 25 November 1926 - 14 February 2002 ) , or Ajay , was a Pakistani film director , producer and screenwriter . He was the brother of filmmaker Abdur Rashid Kardar and the cousin of international cricketer Abdul Hafeez Kardar . He is credited in particular for having directed The Day Shall Dawn ( Jago Hua Savera ) , a film which has received international recognition and numerous awards . It was the first Pakistani film to be submitted for an Oscar in the Best Foreign Film Category .
Singapore ( /ˈsɪŋ ( ɡ ) əpɔːr/ ( listen ) ) , officially the Republic of Singapore , is a sovereign city-state and island country in Southeast Asia . Singapore is located about one degree ( 137 kilometres or 85 miles ) north of the equator , and is situated off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula , and by extension , the southernmost extremity of continental Asia . The island country shares its southern maritime border with Indonesia 's Riau Islands , its northern , western , and eastern maritime borders with the Johor state of Peninsular Malaysia , and is in the vicinity of Sumatra to its west and Borneo to its east . It is enveloped by the littoral waters of the Johore Strait to its north and the Singapore Strait to its south , and is geographically positioned within the confluence of the Indian and Pacific Oceans , being bounded by the Malacca Strait to its west and the South China Sea to its east . The country 's territory is composed of one main island and 58 smaller islets , the combined area of which has increased by almost 25% since the country 's independence as a result of extensive land reclamation projects . Although Singapore has been a constituent part of several Hindu-Buddhist thalassocratic empires and Islamic sultanates throughout its millennia-long history , modern Singapore , then part of the erstwhile Johor Sultanate , was founded in 1819 when Stamford Raffles , a British colonial officer , established a trading post of the East India Company on the island . In 1824 , the island and its satellite islets were fully ceded by the Johor Sultanate , and in 1826 , Singapore was incorporated into the Straits Settlements , a group of East India Company territories in the Malay peninsula . From 1830 to 1858 , the Straits Settlements were administered as a Malayan subdivision of the East India Company 's Bengal Presidency ; following the Indian Rebellion of 1857 , the Presidency and its constituent Settlements were reorganised into the British Raj . In 1867 , Britain 's colonial holdings in the Malay archipelago were separated from British India , and the administration of the Straits Settlements was transferred from Calcutta to London , bringing the Straits Settlements under the direct control of the British Crown as a crown colony . From 1867 to the 1940s , Singapore grew into a successful entrepôt that attracted settlers and sojourners from the region and beyond . During the Second World War , Imperial Japan successfully invaded Singapore , resulting in an interregnum of British rule corresponding with a brief Japanese occupation from 1942 to 1945 . Following Japan 's surrender in 1945 , the Straits Settlements were dissolved , with Singapore being returned to British control as a standalone crown colony in 1946 .
The Kingdom and the Beauty ( Chinese : 江山美人 ; pinyin : Jiang shan mei ren ) is a 1959 Hong Kong musical-drama film directed by Li Han-hsiang . The film was set in Imperial China , directed by a Hong Kong based-Mainland Chinese director and produced by the famed Hong Kong Shaw Brothers film studio . Although there was minimal Singaporean input in the film-making , the film was selected as the Singaporean entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not nominated .
Richard Li Han Hsiang ( Chinese : 李翰祥 ; pinyin : Lǐ Hànxiáng ; 7 March 1926 in Jinxi , Liaoning - 17 December 1996 in Beijing ) was a Chinese film director . Li directed more than 70 films in his career beginning in the 1950s and lasting till the 1990s . His The Enchanting Shadow , The Magnificent Concubine , and Empress Wu Tse-Tien were entered into the Cannes Film Festival in 1960 , 1962 , and 1963 respectively . Li also won the Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards for his work on the movie Xi Shi in 1965 . Most of his movies in the 1970s and 1980s were Chinese historical dramas . He died in Beijing due to a heart attack . He was seventy .
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia ( SFRY ) , also known as SFR Yugoslavia or simply Yugoslavia , was a country located in Central and Southeastern Europe that existed from its foundation in the aftermath of World War II until its dissolution in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars . Covering an area of 255,804 km² ( 98,766 sq mi ) , the SFRY was bordered by the Adriatic Sea and Italy to the west , Austria and Hungary to the north , Bulgaria and Romania to the east , and Albania and Greece to the south . The nation was a socialist state and a federation governed by the League of Communists of Yugoslavia and made up of six socialist republics - Bosnia and Herzegovina , Croatia , Macedonia , Montenegro , Serbia , and Slovenia - with Belgrade as its capital . In addition , it included two autonomous provinces within Serbia : Kosovo and Vojvodina . The SFRY 's origin is traced to 26 November 1942 , when the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia was formed during World War II . On 29 November 1945 , the Federal People 's Republic of Yugoslavia was proclaimed after the deposition of King Peter II , thus ending the monarchy . Until 1948 , the new communist government originally sided with the Eastern Bloc under the leadership of Josip Broz Tito at the beginning of the Cold War , but after the Tito-Stalin split of 1948 , Yugoslavia pursued a policy of neutrality . It became one of the founding members of the Non-Aligned Movement , and transitioned from a command economy to market-based socialism . The SFRY maintained neutrality during the Cold War as part of its foreign policy . It was a founding member of CERN , the United Nations , Non-Aligned Movement , OSCE , IFAD , WTO , Eutelsat , and BTWC . Following the death of Tito on 4 May 1980 , the Yugoslav economy started to collapse , which increased unemployment and inflation . The economic crisis led to a rise in ethnic nationalism in the late 1980s and early 1990s ; dissidence resulted among the multiple ethnicities within the constituent republics .
Train Without a Timetable ( Serbo-Croatian : Vlak bez voznog reda ) is a 1959 Yugoslav film directed by Veljko Bulajić . It was entered into the 1959 Cannes Film Festival . The film was also selected as the Yugoslav entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards , but was not accepted as a nominee .
Serbo-Croatian ( /ˌsɜːrboʊkroʊˈeɪʃən , -bə-/ ( listen ) ; srpskohrvatski / српскохрватски or hrvatskosrpski/ хрватскoсрпски ; also called Serbo-Croat /ˌsɜːrboʊˈkroʊæt , -bə-/ , Serbo-Croat-Bosnian [ SCB ] , Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian [ BCS ] , or Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian [ BCMS ] ) is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia , Croatia , Bosnia and Herzegovina , and Montenegro . It is a pluricentric language with four mutually intelligible standard varieties . South Slavic languages historically formed a continuum . The turbulent history of the area , particularly due to expansion of the Ottoman Empire , resulted in a patchwork of dialectal and religious differences . Due to population migrations , Shtokavian became the most widespread language in the western Balkans , intruding westwards into the area previously occupied by Chakavian and Kajkavian ( which further blend into Slovenian in the northwest ) . Bosniaks , Croats and Serbs differ in religion and were historically often part of different cultural circles , although a large part of the nations have lived side by side under foreign overlords . During that period , the language was referred to under a variety of names , such as Slavic in general or Serbian , Croatian or Bosnian in particular . In a classicizing manner , it was also referred to as Illyrian . The process of linguistic standardization of Serbo-Croatian was originally initiated in the mid-19th-century Vienna Literary Agreement by Croatian and Serbian writers and philologists , decades before a Yugoslav state was established . From the very beginning , there were slightly different literary Serbian and Croatian standards , although both were based on the same dialect of Shtokavian , Eastern Herzegovinian . In the 20th century , Serbo-Croatian served as the official language of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia ( when it was called Serbo-Croato-Slovenian ) , and later as one of the official languages of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia . The breakup of Yugoslavia affected language attitudes , so that social conceptions of the language separated on ethnic and political lines .
Veljko Bulajić ( born 22 March 1928 ) is a Montenegrin-Croatian film director and UNESCO Kalinga Prize recipient . He has spent the majority of his life working in Croatia and is primarily known for directing the Yugoslav state-sponsored World War II-themed movies from the Partisan film genre . Bulajić was a resistance fighter in World War II having joined the Yugoslav Partisans group at the age of 13 . Bulajić and his two older brothers were all wounded in battle and at one point his entire family was imprisoned in an Italian fascist concentration camp . The two surviving brothers , Veljko and Stevan , would later co-write the movies Kozara and Battle of Neretva . According to the Croatian Public Broadcasting Company , his films have reached an audience in excess of 500 million viewers worldwide . The top four most viewed Yugoslav films of all time were all directed by Bulajic .