TOKYO -- Japanese director Ryusuke Hamaguchi's "Drive My Car," nominated for four Academy Awards categories -- best picture, best director, best adapted screenplay and best international feature film -- is the first Japanese movie to be nominated for best picture, and the first to be nominated for multiple categories since Japanese director Akira Kurosawa's 1986 movie "Ran."
It is fair to say that Hamaguchi has been recognized by Hollywood, on a par with the internationally renowned Kurosawa. The movie will compete with American films at the Oscar awards ceremony on March 27.
