2023 Oscar Nominated Short Films: Documentary, Animated and Live Action

For the first time I viewed all fifteen nominated short films before the big ceremony and have my own picks for my favorites. In the Documentary category I really like The Elephant Whisperers. This film from India shows a dedicated couple in a wildlife preserve who have dedicated their lives to caring for orphaned Asian elephants that have been separated from their herds. My animated favorite was The Flying Sailor, about a sailor flying through the air as a result of the largest non-nuclear explosion ever created when a cargo ship loaded with TNT has a mishap. The poor sailor has all his clothes blown off and sees his life flash before him as he miraculously survives. Two in the Live Action category are especially worth mentioning. Le Pupille concerns the young girls in a Catholic orphanage in Italy during World War II. It involves a rather risqué song on the radio, a Christmas pageant and a luscious red cake. In The Red Suitcase a young girl arrives in a foreign country from Iran where she has been promised to wed a much older man. It is clear that she does not want this new life and will do anything to escape this fate.

2021 Oscar Nominated Live Action Shorts

I recently viewed the Oscar Nominated Shorts in an actual theater, something I have not done in over a year. There were five shorts in the Live Action category and all were very good. Three of them shared a common theme that was about people choosing to do the right thing in a difficult situation. Feeling Through is about a young black man who is out late at night in a city and encounters a blind and deaf man who needs help getting home. The young man has to choose between his own plans and the needs of this stranger. White Eye is from Israel and concerns a young man who discovers his bicycle on the street that was stolen from him a month previously. It is in the possession of an undocumented alien who is struggling to provide for his own family. The Letter Room stars Oscar Isaac as a prison guard who is assigned the job of reading letters to inmates to look for suspicious correspondence. This includes the prisoners on death row, especially one inmate who is receiving alarming letters from his girlfriend on the outside. The guard is concerned that the prisoner never writes back to her so inserts himself into the situation.  But my personal favorite was The Present. It is about a Palestinian family living in Israel who have to deal with the travel restrictions placed on them by the Israeli government and how they are treated by the Israeli soldiers. It is quite dramatic and includes some intense moments of confrontation. I am hoping for a win for The Present when the Oscars are presented on April 25.

2019 Oscar Nominated Animated Short Films

The animated shorts showed a wide variety of styles and dealt with some serious matters, but included some healthy comedy as well.  The subjects included separation of parents and children, issues of aging, the challenges of divorced parents and connections of parents to children even after the parent’s passing.  My own favorite was the pure comedy in the bunch.  This was called Animal Behavior.  The premise involved a therapy session for a variety of animals all with personal problems being led by a pit bull therapist.  The cast includes a leach with needy tendencies, a bird who ate his own brother out of selfishness, a praying mantis who can’t get dates because she has a thousand offspring, a pig who can’t stop eating and an ape with anger management problems.  There is also a cat who is obsessed with keeping clean and constantly licks herself.  This was easily the funniest of the bunch.  Another very notable film was One Small Step about a young girl who dreams of being an astronaut and is encouraged to follow her dream by her father even after he has passed away.  I am hoping that Animal Behavior ends up as the winner.

2019 Oscar Nominated Live Action Short Films

There was a wide variety of subjects addressed in this year’s short films, but all were very serious.  Not one of the shorts could be called a comedy which is unusual.  Perhaps that is a sign of the times we live in.  Four out of the five actually involved children being placed in danger strangely enough so several of them should be considered disturbing.  The one I liked the best was called Mother is from Spain.  The short largely consists of one single continuous scene where the only people on screen are a young woman who is a mother and her mother.  The two go about their business in the apartment as normal until the mother receives a phone call from her six year old son who is calling from an unknown beach.  It seems he was with his father, but now the father is missing and the boy is left all alone on a barren beach with no one in sight.  The mother is forced to deal with this terrifying situation, trying to figure out where he is and notifying the police of the terrible predicament.  It is a harrowing, well-acted scene.  My guess is that the eventual winner will be Skin which deals with the matter of hate and violence between the white and black characters.