I agree with the Golden Globes decision to delare F-9/11 ineligible, but not their reasoning on Gibson’s Passion.
F-9/11 is a documentary (albeit a biased one), and if the Golden Globes doesn’t consider documentaries, it’s not eligible. (Some people argue documentaries can’t be biased, but every individual on earth has biases, and anyone who believes that a documentary doesn’t reflect the filmmaker’s biases is closing their eyes to human nature. At least Moore is out in the open about his biases.)
However, just because a film is in a foreign language doesn’t make it a foreign film. What would happen if an American Producer and Director made a film with all actresses and actors being Spanish-speaking Americans, and set the film in America? Would the Golden Globes rule it was a foreign film? Apparently so.
Well, from what I can tell, the GG rules require Best Picture nominees to be English-language film, so yes, a domestically-produced spanish language film wouldn’t be eligible.
I imagine that the not-entirely-accurately-named Foreign Film category has criteria something along the line of “films not qualifying for best picture.”