REVIEW: 2010 Oscar Animated Shorts

Viewing the Oscar Animated Shorts in the theater has become a favorite February ritual of mine. It's enjoyable to watch them online, too, but there's something about the immersive theater experience that really makes these short films pop, even more so than feature length film. In these, every frame and every second counts, so the rich details are just jam packed into every corner of the screen.

Last year I didn't think there was any question as to which of the shorts was the best - La Maison en Petits Cubes, as I posted here numerous times, was the deserving winner. This year I'm not as confident either in the winner or even in my own opinion of what should win. Two of the films - A Matter of Loaf and Death and Logorama - stand out for their quality and creativity, respectively, so my guess is it will be one of those two, but whatever happens, here are my thoughts on the whole bunch. I've included trailers for most, but if they aren't at a theater near you I really urge you to find them online, not for the purposes of winning your Oscar pool, but because they really are astonishing achievements in animation.

Flyway Film Festival: Colore Non Vedenti

Colore Non Vedenti
Jay Cheel, 2009 (Official Website)
Run time: 29 min.  |  Canada 
Categories: International Zombie Summit

When you spend as much time as I do reading and writing about movies, names of critics and bloggers and freelance writers often blend together in an incomprehensible mish-mash (by some definition I could be considered all three, for example). So when I saw the name Jay Cheel listed as the director of Colore Non Vedenti, the wheels in my head started turning - where had I seen that name? About ten seconds of searching provided me with the answer, as I've read a lot of Jay's writing at both Film Junk and, much more so, The Documentary Blog.

This all means nothing in the context of the charming Colore Non Vedenti, aside from perhaps proof that Jay can make films just as well as he can write about them. This sci-fi "zombie" thriller comedy (it kind of defies labeling) is well-written, assuredly directed, and impressively acted. It's evidence that low-budget does not mean low-quality, making it a perfect companion to the Cannes zombie hit Colin (reportedly made for $70), with which it will screen at Flyway.

Flyway Film Festival: Reviews of Selected Shorts

I've really only come to appreciate short films in the last few years, almost entirely because of the theatrical screenings of the Oscar nominees every February. In fact I think I'd rather watch La Maison en Petits Cubes, last year's Oscar winner for Best Animated Short, again than the much-lauded Up (which I nonetheless did like). Anyway, my point is that shorts aren't the amateur and/or unimportant productions I may have once thought they were; many filmmakers even make a career out of short films.

There is an almost overwhelmingly high number of shorts playing at the Flyway Film Festival this weekend, and I've been fortunate to get a peek at several of them. Unfortunately one of them that I was really excited for, Surprise!, didn't play in my region-limited DVD player, so I can't say anything about it other than that it sounds like a promisingly boffo French comedy: "As an attentive husband, Pierre has prepared a surprise for his wife Brigitte's birthday, but a series of harmless incidents (like a draft, a sun beam reflected off a window) brings the next door neighbor into his bed just as Brigitte walks through the door." Maybe not high-minded comedy, but if handled the right way these set-ups can be hilarious.

So while I haven't seen Surprise!, here are some words about four shorts that I have seen, in alphabetical order and including video when I've found it available.

REVIEW: 2009 Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts

This year I was once again able to see the five Best Animated Short Film nominees in the theater, which I still strongly recommend you do when they come to a theater near you, even though you can currently watch four of the five online. A bonus if you go to the theater, though - you get to see the five "highly commended" shorts that didn't make the cut as nominees: Varmints (UK), John and Karen (UK), Gopher Broke (U.S.), Skhizein (France), and Hot Dog (U.S.). Of these, John and Karen was possibly my favorite (watch it online). Varmints was visually arresting but a bit long at 24 minutes, and Skhizein was a Charlie Kaufman film from start to finish. The other two - both American films - were decent at best, unimaginative and immature at worst.

The nominees:

La Maison en Petits Cubes - (Japan, 12 min):

• My personal pick for the best of this year's bunch, La Maison en Petits Cubes is a heartbreaking and evocative story of an elderly man hanging on to a lifetime of memories as his house gradually floods. Animated in what appears to be watercolor or pencil, it also boasts one of the best musical scores I heard all year (short film or feature film), and it brought many in the theater to tears. Tragically, La Maison en Petits Cubes is the only one of the shorts currently unavailable for viewing online. Update: I found it - watch it here!  

 

Lavatory - Lovestory - (Russia, 10 min)

• A cute romantic story about a lovelorn public restroom attendant, this black-and-white sketched film is curiously captivating. It may be a minute or two longer than necessary, but the ending is a great payoff and I admire its simplicity.
  

Oktapodi - (France, 3 min)

• Short, sweet, and sharply edited, this screwball story of octopus love looked fantastic on the big screen. I'm sure there was a temptation to make this longer, but the filmmakers probably didn't want to run out of steam and lose the comedic momentum. If Finding Nemo hadn't already been made, it's possible this might have been stretched into a feature.
  

Presto - (U.S., 5 min)

• Most everyone who saw WALL*E in the theater has already had the pleasure of seeing Pixar's Presto. For me, the second time around wasn't nearly as funny. Cute rabbit, but a little too repetitive for my taste, and it seemed to be playing for cheap laughs more than anything else. I don't know, I guess I'm just a little annoyed that this is the likely winner, possibly due to an overflow of love for WALL*E. Then again, Pixar shorts have lost in previous years...
  

This Way Up - (UK, 9 min)

• A pair of undertakers (father and son) run into all kinds of trouble on their way to the cemetery in this macabre comedy. It's impressively animated and consistently entertaining, but it didn't have me rolling in the aisles like seemingly everyone else in the theater. Nonetheless, it's an above average short film and deserves to be nominated.
  

I'm thinking it will come down to Presto or La Maison en Petits Cubes. The latter is far and away my preference, but I'm just too nervous about Pixar's power, so Presto remains my prediction as the winner. Hope I'm wrong...

REVIEW: 2008 Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts

I had the great pleasure to catch the five Animated Short nominees last weekend. In contrast to the Live Action Shorts, these are truly a trip into some new dimensions in film. Each of the nominees features breathtaking animation, some of which I've never seen before (or seen so impressively), and since none of them are American you get a little slice of culture, too. You can try to see them here, but it's a really great experience in the theater - go whenever you have a chance in the future. I do not think you'll regret it.

Instead of "grading" these, I'm going to match them up with what I consider their 2007 Best Picture nominee equivalents. No reason - I liked all of these, so it's just a match game.

The nominees:

I Met the Walrus - Josh Raskin (Canada, 5 min, ink drawing/computer graphic animation):

• This is not so much a short film as it is an animated visualization of words. A 1969 recording of John Lennon rambling about peace, war, governments, and the world is turned into an impressive layout of graphics, images and words in pink, brown, and ivory hues. Something about this reminded me of a Gap commercial or something "hip" like that. It's very cool, but it's just not what you would traditionally call a film. It's the most uplifting of the five nominees, and the political ideas and rants might appeal to the Academy.
  
• 2007 Best Picture equivalent = Michael Clayton

Madame Tutli-Putli - Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski (Canada, 17 min, stop-motion/CGI animation)

• If David Lynch made an animated film, this would be it. A meek woman boards a train to an unknown destination. Stuck in a sleeping car with a disgusting tennis player, a creepy kid, and two chess players, her trip turns downright macabre when a mysterious blue light signals organ-harvesting thieves to board the train and gas the passengers. Ah, and I haven't mentioned the moth, white bright light and chirpy sounds that the woman follows in her desperation. I'm already lost again, which I think was kind of the point. This was the most disturbing, most impressively animated, and most memorable nominee.
  
• 2007 Best Picture equivalent = No Country for Old Men

Meme Les Pigeons Vont au Paradis - Samuel Tourneux and Simon Vanesse (France, 9 min, 3-D CGI animation)

• The ultimate battle between good and evil, life and death, angel and demon. When "Death" is supposed to come calling, a "Priest" steps in and saves the elderly Frenchman whose time has come. The priest's motive? Milking the man of his last dollar before death. A humorous trick is played before one character receives a karmic comeuppance in a very abrupt ending.
• 2007 Best Picture equivalent = There Will Be Blood

Moya Lyubov - Alexander Petrov (Russia, 27 min, hand-painted animation)

• A teenage Russian boy is caught in a love triangle in 19th-century Russia. His dreams and fantasies are lovely, disturbing, and really hard to follow. But I guess that's how dreams are. Watching this was like seeing the world in watercolor - hard to describe. Petrov is the only previous nominee in this group, and a previous winner at that. Maybe that makes him the favorite.
  
• 2007 Best Picture equivalent = Atonement

Peter & the Wolf - Suzie Templeton and Hugh Welchman (UK/Poland, 27 min, silicon model/stop-motion animation)

• The classic story of poor Peter and his heroic task is retold here in stunning stop-motion animation. This was the funniest and overall most entertaining of the nominees, but its ending drags - and I don't even know if it's the "right" ending. Something didn't feel right about it, but I'm not going to spend time looking up the accuracy of children's stories (not that I wouldn't look up other trivial information). The music was great, as you would expect.
• 2007 Best Picture equivalent = Juno

Predicting which of these five will on Sunday is, at least for me, a complete shot in the dark. They are so different from each other that I don't know what will appeal to the Academy members' tastes. I Met the Walrus seems totally out of place here, but maybe that's why it will win. Madame Tutli-Putli is the most impressive artistically, but the story is creepy and weird. Peter & the Wolf is a classic, and the other two are terrific stories. Without having a serious inside connection, I don't know how this can be accurately predicted.

I'll go with Madame Tutli-Putli.



...(or Moya Lyubov). Forget it, who knows.