Aamir Khan-produced Laapataa Ladies renamed Lost Ladies for international audiences, has been eliminated from the Oscar 2025 race. Directed by Kiran Rao, the film was India’s official entry for the Best International Feature category. On Tuesday, The Academy announced its shortlist, and Laapataa Ladies did not make it to the list. Grammy Award winner Ricky Kej was among the first to respond to the news, expressing on X that the film was the “wrong choice” to represent India at the Oscars.

Expressing his thoughts Ricky said “So, the @TheAcademy Oscars shortlist is out. #Laapataa Ladies is a very well-made, entertaining movie (I enjoyed it), but was absolutely the wrong choice to represent India for the best #InternationalFeatureFilm category. As expected, it lost. When are we going to realize.. year after year.. we are choosing the wrong films? There are so many excellent movies made, and we should be winning the #InternationalFeatureFilm category every year!"

He further stated, “Unfortunately, we live in a ‘Mainstream Bollywood’ bubble, where we cannot look beyond films that we find entertaining. Instead, we should focus on great films made by uncompromising filmmakers—low budget or big budget, star or no star—just great artistic cinema.” He added, “Below is the poster of Laapataa Ladies. I’m sure most Academy voting members dismissed the film just by looking at these.”

Out of 85 eligible countries and regions, 15 international films have moved on to the next round of voting. While Laapataa Ladies was not included, Santosh, a Hindi-language film from the United Kingdom, made it to the shortlist.

Laapataa Ladies was picked from 29 films, including Bollywood hit Animal, Malayalam National Award winner Aattam, and Cannes winner All We Imagine As Light. Aamir Khan and Kiran Rao have been promoting the film in the US with special screenings.

Meanwhile, All We Imagine As Light has been a strong contender in the international awards season, earning nominations at the 2025 Golden Globe and Critics Choice Awards.