Sonali Kulkarni elated over `The Good Road` Oscar entry

Mumbai: Bollywood actress Sonali Kulkarni has expressed her excitement over her Gujarati film `The Good Road` being India`s entry at the Oscars this year.

`The Good Road`, a Gujarati-language film, has been chosen as India`s entry to the 2014 Oscars, stealing attention from a critically acclaimed love story that was screened at the Cannes film festival this year. "All my films have somehow made India known in the international arena. You can take any of my films. Last year, I did three good films all at once. The first film was `Singham` which made more than 1000 million rupees ($ 15.94 million ) at the box office; the second film was `Deool` (Marathi Film) which won the National award for the best feature film and the third film was `The Good Road` which has been chosen as the official entry for the Oscars from India. I am feeling very proud of myself," said Kulkarni. Gyan Correa`s debut film is about two children lost in the Kutch desert won a national award for best Gujarati-language film this year, but was a dark horse among the 22 movies in the running to be India`s official entry to the Oscars in the best foreign film category. The film deals with three storylines, which cross each other on the film`s titular highway. Expectations had been high for Ritesh Batra`s `The Lunchbox`, an Indian-French-German co-production that won the Grand Rail d`Or at Critics` Week at Cannes in May. Meanwhile, Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap, one of the producers of `The Lunchbox`, took to Twitter to express his disappointment. "... it goes to show, why we completely lack the understanding to make films that can travel across borders," Kashyap said. While, Kulkarni, playing the character of `Kiran`in the film said the `Lunchbox` film team were just expressing their displeasure over the announcement of the Film Federation of India. "I think the `Lunchbox` film team did not want to create a controversy. Anurag just wanted to show his displeasure because his film was not selected for the Oscar nominations. It`s fair for them to voice their opinions. Anyway, he didn`t say anything against `The Good Road`. He was just rooting for his film," said Kulkarni. An Indian film has never won the best foreign film Oscar, but `Lagaan`, `Salaam Bombay` and `Mother India` were shortlisted for the award. `Lagaan` was the last to make the cut in 2001. ANI