If 1946 cracked open the door for foreign films at the Oscars, 1947 swung it wide open.

It wasn’t just the acting, directing and writing categories that were invaded this time, but the sacred domain of the technical world. Two British imports, Great Expectations and Black Narcissus won the Cinematography and Art Direction awards, Great Expectations in the black-and-white category and Black Narcissus sin the color competition. On top of that, the Academy chose to recognize the foreign language invasion with a Special Oscar awarded the Italian Shoe-Shine.

As it did the year before, the Academy made way for a British import directed by David Lean among the Best Picture nominees. Along with Lean’s film of Dickens’ Great Expectations, nominations went to The Bishop’s Wife; Crossfire; Gentleman’s Agreement and Miracle on 34th Street. The Best Director line-up included the men who helmed four of them: Henry Koster (The Bishop’s Wife); Edward Dmytryk (Crossfire); Elia Kazan (Gentleman’s Agreement) and Lean. George Seaton, the writer-director of Miracle on 34th Street had to be content with a screenplay nomination which led to an actual win in that category.

The fifth nominee for Best Director was George Cukor for A Double Life. Though rarely thought of in the director’s oeuvre today, his nomination here wasn’t a quirk. The film had also been nominated in three other categories including Best Actor, for which veteran Ronald Colman was considered the front-runner. Its chances at becoming a Best Picture nominee in an expanded scenario of ten was quite likely at the time, squeezing out such better remembered films as Jacques Tourneur’s Out of the Past; John Ford’s The Fugitive and Jules Dassin’s Brute Force. Though those films are more highly regarded today they were apparently not on Oscar’s radar at the time. None of them was nominated for a single award.

What then, would have been the films to round out a ten Best Picture slate in 1947?

Certainly the gorgeously mounted Black Narcissus would have been there. Another highly regarded film from the British invasion of1947, Odd Man Out would likely have been there as well. Though it received only one nomination for its Editing, one has to believe that director Carol Reed and star James Mason would have been on the short list of potential nominees in their respective categories.

Faring better, Robert Rossen’s hard-hitting boxing drama, Body and Soul was nominated for three Oscars and won one. It had to have been a major contender.

That leaves us only one spot. Would it have gone to Boomerang! or Monsieur Verdoux, both recognized in the writing categories? While they may have gotten a few votes, they probably wouldn’t have gotten enough to overcome the enormous affection for such lighter mainstream fare as The Farmer’s Daughter, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir and Life With Father. I’d give the edge to The Farmer’s Daughter, which after all, did win Loretta Young a surprise Best Actress Oscar.