(ANSA) - ROME, DEC 18 - Italian director Maura Delpero's Vermiglio has made the shortlist of 15 movies running for the best international film Oscar, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) said on Tuesday.
    The five films selected to be nominated for the Oscar will be announced on January 17 ahead of the Academy Awards ceremony on March 2 in Los Angeles.
    The intimate drama, which is largely spoken in Northern Italian dialect, focuses on the effects of World War II on a small town.
    A war story without bombs or big battles "in the ironclad logic of the mountains which every day remind man how small he is", according to its director, has turned into a surprise local box office sensation.
    It won the Venice Film Festival's Silver Lion award. (ANSA).