The Israeli film Footnote, up for an Oscar for best foreign language film, is Israel's fourth such nomination in the past five years - giving Israel more nominations during that period than any other country.

It is an indication to the renaissance of Israeli cinema, which has grown from a fledgling industry with poor cinematography and low box office sales to a darling of world film festivals.

The last three Israeli films that made it to the Oscar shortlist all mine the country's troubles with its Arab neighbours.

Beaufort, nominated in 2008, and Waltz with Bashir, nominated a year later, both explored Israeli soldiers' experiences in Lebanon.

Ajami, the 2010 nominee, centred on Arab-Jewish tensions in a violent neighbourhood near Tel Aviv.

This year's nomination went to an Israeli film featuring a more internal conflict - two professors of Talmud, a father and son, duelling for academic prestige and a coveted national prize.

Israeli cinema was long an embarrassment. Cheap comic melodramas were the norm in the 1960s and 1970s.

Called 'bourekas films', they dealt with ethnic stereotypes of European and Middle Eastern Jews.

Sick of those tired tropes, a group of Israeli filmmakers created a national movie fund in 1979, named the Israeli Fund to Encourage Quality Films.

But the industry still floundered for two decades.

In 1995, the government cut public funding for cinema in half, leaving enough money to produce only five films a year.

Three years later the industry hit an all-time low: Only 0.3 per cent of Israeli film goers bought tickets to Hebrew-language cinema.

The national film body took on a new name, the Israel Film Fund, and in 2000 it begged the Knesset to save national cinema.

It did, boosting the budget to $10 million a year for investment in feature films, mandating that young filmmakers get a chance to make themselves known.

It is what gave Beaufort and Footnote director Joseph Cedar his first big break fresh out of film school.

The Israel Film Fund supported his first feature, Time of Favour, in 2000.

The boost in public funding has dovetailed with investments in Israeli cinema by European and Canadian producers.

Israel's television industry has also blossomed in recent years. Now Hollywood TV executives are taking notice, adapting Israeli shows for American audiences.

Hit thriller Homeland is adapted from the Israeli drama Prisoners of War. The American adaptation will be shown on Channel 4 in the coming months.

And Be Tipul became the award-winning In Treatment. The original Israeli version started on Sky Arts this week.

Other Israeli adaptations are currently in development for American TV.