So Lagaan lost. And let's admit that wasn't a complete surprise. We were all hoping that it would win, but when you think of the enormity of that task, we shouldn't really be disappointed.

Consider the odds: in the main category of Oscars, it's generally English language films that are eligible. Which really means films produced in the United States of America and in the United Kingdom. That leaves the rest of the world to compete for the Best Foreign Language Film award. When you think that there are at least 70 countries, which actively produce films and send them up for Oscar selection, that one single prize becomes an extremely tough one to get. Which is why just being one of the five nominations is enough cause for celebration.

Why did Lagaan lose? To answer that we should first look at why we thought it would win.

First and foremost, it has universal appeal. That appeal lies in its unequal battle between two sides, one of which is clearly the underdog. When David fights Goliath, you can bet the whole world will cheer David.

Except in only one case. Which is that David is a SOB and Goliath is a gentle giant. Then size won't matter to us and we will surely be in the Goliath camp. In Lagaan, there was no such ambiguity. In the age-old tradition of Hindi cinema, David was shiny-bright white and Goliath was nasty-dark black.

This universal appeal also rests on the film's brilliantly conceived cricket match. The match becomes a metaphor for a non-violent struggle against an oppressor, with the only weapons in the hands of the underdog being the oppressor's weapons, so that David has to beat Goliath at his own game. In this case, literally.

There were other, more peripheral reasons why Lagaan could have won. Academy members who vote for the Oscars have shown in the past that they favour inspirational films: Gandhi being the most prominent example. And Lagaan, in its own way, is an inspirational movie.

The Academy has also favoured period films. Gandhi, again, is an example, but so are other big winners like the Gladiator and Ben Hur. There is also a tendency to favour films, which have proven themselves at the box-office, because the Oscars are about mainstream cinema and not art cinema. Then there is the if-it's-epic-length-give-it-the-award syndrome, which works on the assumption that certain films have to be very long because the subject is very important. And Lagaan is certainly long, even by Indian movie standards. The last factor in Lagaan's favour was its sheer originality. Surely that should have tilled the balance in its favour.

But it didn't. In the end No Man's Land won. Since Academy member's votes and views never get known, we can only speculate on the reasons. Some of the factors already mentioned in this article as factors for the film could have worked against it also.

For example, its uniqueness, which may have made it too different for the largely American members of the Academy. That applies also to the cricket match. On the other hand, if the Oscars were an English institution, these factors would have worked in Lagaan's favour. This "foreignness" would also have made the movie's length a bit too much for American Academy members.

But more than this, the main reason for No Man's Land getting the award and not Lagaan lies in the mood of America. After September 11, that mood - as we all know - has been sombre. The film, which won the Best Picture Oscar (A Beautiful Mind), is a very serious look at a very serious subject. The Lord of the Rings, on the other hand, in spite of its record number of nominations, did not win any of the major awards. Could that be because it is primarily a fantasy, a fun film, and the American mood is at total variance with that?

Lagaan, of course, is a fun film too. It is joyous and entertaining and thus out of step with what the jury wanted to see, whereas No Man's Land, dealing with the strife in Bosnia, captured the essence of the mood.

Which is why being just nominated is enough; when it comes to choosing only one out of five very worthy films, a whole lot of extraneous factors come in. You need luck to get that extra push. You need to have made the right film at the right time, for the right mood for the right people.