From left to right: Susanne Bier, director of "After the Wedding" (Denmark), Guillermo del Toro, director of "Pan's Labyrinth" (Mexico), Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, director of "The Lives of Others" (Germany) and Deepa Mehta, director of "Water" (Canada). (Not pictured: Rachid Bouchareb, director of "Days of Glory" ("Indigenes") from Algeria).

Moderated by Mark Johnson, producer of Moonlight Mile, The Notebook, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Best Picture Oscar® winner Rain Man. Featuring representatives of the 2006 Foreign Language Film award nominees.

What began as a small, intimate gathering of directors representing their nominated films in the Foreign Language Film category has turned into an annual standing-room-only event that is as entertaining as it is informative. Each year the Academy invites the five directors to appear onstage to discuss their films and respond to questions from the audience.

The 2006 symposium, as in the past, took place the day before the Oscar presentation ceremony. It brought together some of the world's top filmmakers to address such wide-ranging topics as art, politics and moviemaking. The approximately two-hour event also featured brief clips from the nominated films.