In the past two years, 2006's "Dreamgirls" and 2007's "Enchanted," dominated the song race with three nominations each -- although neither film took home the statuette. A new rule stipulates that only two tunes per movie may be nominated for original song.

In the foreign-language race this year, such critically applauded features as Romania's "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" and France's "Persepolis" failed to score a nomination. In future, an executive committee will be able to rectify any glaring omissions by adding three films to a shortlist of six. As it has done in the past two years, another committee will then winnow the enlarged shortlist to five nominees.

"While I was very proud of our five nominees, I was just more concerned about what we excluded than what we said Mark Johnson, chairman of the Academy's foreign-language committee.

Nominations for next year's Oscars will be announced January 22, and the awards will be presented on February 22.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter