Just like the 2020 edition of AFI Fest, AFI Fest 2021 had some great shorts available to view on the online platform throughout the duration of the festival. This year’s mix ranged from multi-media animation featured in Love, Dad and H.A.G.S. to documentaries about death (The Death Cleaner), and travelled from Singapore (Strawberry Cheesecake) to Sudan (Al-Sit). Here are four of the Best Shorts from AFI Fest 2021. Look out for them on streaming platforms and other film festivals in the near future.
Best Shorts AFI Fest 2021
Love, Dad (Czech Republic)
In Love, Dad, the director Diana Cam Van Nguyen finds some letters of love her estranged dad wrote years ago. She uses a mix of styles to help process her emotions. The quickly narrated diary style gives the film a constantly moving stream-of-consciousness to keep her emotions flowing whilst the mixed-in animation allows her to speak about her relationship with some emotional distance. Much like last year’s winner Tiger and Ox in which a daughter identifies with her strict mother through animation, Van Nguyen manages to forgive her absent dad with the help of the comfort of animation.
Zonder Meer (Belgium)
Zonder Meer perfectly captures youthful summer holiday vibes at a Belgian camp-site. The camerawork brings us down to 5 year old Lucie’s innocent kid curiosity and the grainy colors give off a nostalgic warmth. However, the patient editing and 360 audio gradually expose us to the tragedy unfolding on the edge of Lucie’s consciousness: a boy has disappeared and may have drowned. Whilst Lucie quietly continues her explorations with other kids her age, the adults, unprotected from reality worry for the missing kid and their family.
Her Dance (Israel)
Bar Cohen’s Her Dance follows Aya, a Trans Woman, as she surprises her sister and Orthodox Jewish family at their house on Shabbat night. Because of her appearance, she’s met with scorn by her mother and sidelined by her family. However, the more she’s pushed away, the more determined she feels to stay. This lends an uneasy tension to the short which culminates in a memorable dancing scene (pictured above) and duel with her mother amongst a cheering circle of guests.
BabyBangz (U.S.)
Anastasia Ebel’s BabyBangz captures a hairdressing salon in New Orleans specializing in natural hair. While this might sound pretty mundane, this is no ordinary hairdressing salon. These hairdressers offer a complete experience, offering you world advice of a therapist and educational lessons with book recommendations in addition to a unique haircut. The tone of the movie matches the inspiring content. It features ethereal piano scales layered into the soundtrack (much like in Garrett Bradley’s Time) and an artistic mix of close ups and people living in and around the salon mimicking the style of Khalil Joseph. Both the salon and the film will inspire you to start something.
Head to our AFI Fest 2021 Hub for more reviews and short films from AFI Fest 2021.
Watching the 2022 Oscar shorts is the quickest and easiest way to get closer to watching all of the Oscar contenders. The short films also typically contain a more diverse selection of films than the feature nominees. This year’s nominees come from four continents and range from a creepy Chilean animation to a documentary set in Afghanistan. So if you’re looking for something to say at the Academy Awards on the 27th, check these short films out at cinemas near you.
The Animated 2022 Oscar Shorts
Affairs of the Art (U.K./Canada)
In over three decades since the conception of Beryl, the leading lady of Quinn’s exasperating comic piece Affairs of the Art, the pace and nature of animation, feminism, and sexually-driven dramaticism have all shifted drastically. Quinn’s nominated short is another document of Beryl’s mental misadventures, an abstract cartoon of imaginative family constructs that threaten to break any semblance of sane reality with every passing narration.
Quinn’s latest relies on its draftsmanship, a force beyond reckoning that compiles some of the most interesting shots of characterization among any ensemble cast in this year’s Oscar nominee pool, feature-length or otherwise. It’s a shame that Affairs is so bogged down by its frenetic involvement in personal mind-wandering that any sort of meaningful plot elements remain impossible to grasp through 16 minutes of running time. It is best to marvel and/or gawk at the restless spirit of Beryl’s peers than to make any grander sense of the screwball antics at show. -ST
Bestia (Chile)
Even with context, the Chilean Bestia is a difficult piece to wrangle into short summary. An allegory for militant upheavel caused during the country’s multi-decade era of dictatorship in the 20th century, it follows the porcelain Ingrid Olderöck, an officer ingrained in systems of torture, interrogation and suggested sexual assault, as she grapples with the damage that a nation’s collective political anguish has caused to her own mental state.
Bestia boasts an extremely delicate take on modern psychological horror, the composition and editing of Ingrid’s memory-driven story treated with a very fine balance between shock, abstraction, and historical signifiers. Covarrubias’ short, the most immediately praise-worthy of this year’s animated showcase, dives incredibly deep into a realm of traumatic pain at the cost of its audience’s understanding of the haunting historical subtext at hand, and still manages to come out all the better for the risks at hand. -ST
Boxballet (Russia)
Striking most for its character design, Dyakov’s BoxBallet is a premise of opposites-attracting in the most bluntly conventional manner – a large, brutish-looking boxer, face plump with bruises and broken features, develops a meaningful crush on a local ballet dancer, fragile and swanlike in every respect, as if ripped from a fairy tale book herself so paper-thin in stature. Together, they form a bond of complementary artforms in a world of machismo expectations.
There is something not all too unfamiliar about Dyakov’s short, exploring the nature of public imagery and introspective self-shaming in a form that some Pixar-esque western animation studios have done more progressively (or, anthropomorphically) in the last decade. BoxBallet is, for what can be taken at face value, the most broadly conventional of this year’s animated lineup – which is not to say that, the politics of its host nation aside, it should not lose points for the simplicity of a pleasant, embraceable artstyle and common message to morality. -ST
Robin Robin (U.K.)
A most obviously cute response to the fish-out-of-water tale, Robin Robin is a bird-out-of-sky charmer by the stop-motion institution Aardman Animations: a quaint Christmas anecdote of a young bird mistakenly raised among a family of mice, who shares their common habits of food-stealing and house-sneaking. Through discovery and predatory villainy, namely the softly sinister tabby cat voiced spectacularly by Gillian Anderson, Robin learns about self-identity while also confronting his place in a hostile, though emotionally-accepting environment.
The clever coerciveness of Robin Robin lies primarily in its artstyle, a step beyond even what Aardman has mastered with their claymation features. As if specifically targeted for a newer, younger generation, the stock characters are fully-feltlike creations, pulled directly from a young child’s playpen as if safe for a baby to teethe on. Everything about this particular world is crafted out of durability and softness, two perfect qualities to shape a holiday short out of, anticipating the seasonal return rate this piece will surely receive the studio for years to come, Oscar-win or otherwise. -ST
The Windshield Wiper (Spain)
A rotoscoped anthology of the musings that come with smoking endlessly in a noisy cafe, The Windshield Wiper attempts to dissect the idea of love through several seemingly unrelated vignettes, an extended and existential interpretation of love in the age of technology that silently asks questions about the relationships we fail to attain within an unforgiving society that aggrandizes the disconnected, however hollow-eyed and arrogantly elevated their lifestyle might be.
It’s genuinely difficult to decipher what Alberto Mielgo is going for here – by diving headfirst into the elder tradition of hyperlink storytelling, he’s created a more-than-interesting collage of socio-economic thoughts to ponder. Not unlike a college student’s Tumblr page, however, the cohesiveness of the tech-era message behind The Windshield Wiper takes a backseat to the visual reliance of computer-generated vibes. Any Oscar showcase is welcome to include such a brief level of fantastical randomness among its more traditional fare, but without a clearer direction its hard to see this piece ever penetrating the most frontal layer of any voting body’s minds. -ST
The Documentary 2022 Oscar Shorts
Audible (U.S.)
Audible follows high school athlete Amaree McKenstry and his close friends at Maryland School for the Deaf as they come to the end of their senior year. He’s preparing for the final few football matches whilst they’re all dealing with the trauma of losing a close friend and preparing for life after school.
Audible is told almost entirely from the perspective of Amaree and his fellow students, and therefore almost entirely in sign language (bar a few appearances from hearing people). The heartfelt one-on-one interviews make it an intimate window into the experience of deaf kids on the cusp of adulthood. There are also plenty of well-shot sequences, particularly those of the high school football matches. However, the short tries to cover too much, from dealing with grief to repairing father-son relationships, which means it doesn’t really touch on any one issue very deeply. As a result the film feels more like a quick snapshot of life as a deaf student instead of offering something deeper. -RS
Lead Me Home (U.S.)
500,000 Americans experience homelessness every night. Lead Me Home captures the experience from a range of perspectives; from real-life stories of those experiencing homelessness across three cities on the West Coast (Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle) as well as clips of the unsympathetic.
Lead Me Home does a good job of personalizing the experience of homelessness and humanizing those marginalized because of it. However, it fails to explore the wider issue. Instead of looking at the causes or possible solutions, it just presents the issue as if the audience wasn’t already aware of it. Perhaps the filmmakers didn’t want to politicize the issue by refusing to point a finger anywhere. However in refusing to point a finger, the filmmakers present homelessness as something that exists naturally in all societies rather than an issue that could possibly be solved. -RS
The Queen of Basketball (U.S.)
As an Olympics Gold Medalist, that won 3 national trophies at a collegiate level before being drafted to the NBA, you might think that Luisa Harris would be a household name. However, unfortunately she’s not.
Ben Proudfoot’s The Queen of Basketball does her accomplishments justice. Just like his short from last year, A Concerto is a Conversation, The Queen of Basketball feels incredibly warm thanks to the close one-on-one interviews with Luisa and her infectious laughing. It also has a similar celebratory tone – not just recapping Luisa’s incredible athletic accomplishments but also celebrating her happiness in her humble family life. Ultimately, there’s nothing to fault with this film. It’s well shot, features a beautifully warm subject in Luisa, and is brought together well with the editing to make it feel neither too long nor too fits the running time perfectly. -RS
Three Songs for Benazir (Afghanistan)
Three Songs for Benazir is the only Documentary short contender produced outside the U.S. It documents the story of Shaista, a newly married man living in a displacement camp in Kabul. He struggles to balance his dreams of being the first from his tribe to join the Afghan National Army with his family responsibilities and illiteracy.
Three Songs for Benazir feels like the most ‘real’ documentary of the nominees. It doesn’t feature any one-on-one interviews or direct talking to the camera and there is no interference from the director. Instead, it follows Shaista observationally, catching what feel like more everyday moments in his life living in and around the displacement camp. We follow him as he watches planes in the sky, tries to sign up for the army, and sing a lot (both to himself and others). Whilst it only gives a small glimpse into his life with Benazir, it all feels ‘real’ and authentic, and not shown for show. -RS
When We Were Bullies (U.S.)
After bumping into an old elementary school classmate in his 60s, filmmaker Jay Rosenblatt is compelled to track down his fifth grade class and teacher to examine their memory of and complicity in a bullying incident 50 years ago.
When We Were Bullies is a very self-indulgent short film. In short, the filmmaker decides to make a film to relieve himself of the guilt he still feels from bullying a classmate 50 years ago. He never considers how the film might make his victim (and all other victims of bullying) feel, going so far as to call this out directly in the voiceover (“I didn’t consider how the film will make you feel”). Worse, he doesn’t even care, as covered when he says “The film isn’t really about you, it was about us (the bullies).” It reminded me a bit of ‘white fragility’ in the way the filmmaker centralizes his own guilt, over the actual victims suffering. As a result, it just feels incredibly narrow-sighted, self-centered, and oblivious to what really would be a ‘progressive’ way of examining his guilt today. Plus the animations of his elementary class’ photos are too repetitive. Take his elementary school teacher’s advice and consider avoiding this film. – RS
The Live Action 2022 Oscar Shorts
Ala Kachuu – Take and Run (Switzerland)
19 year old Sezim moves to the Kyrgyz capital to continue her studies when she’s kidnapped by a group of young men and taken into the barren countryside. There, she’s forced to marry a stranger. If she refuses the marriage, she is threatened with social stigmatization and exclusion. Torn between her desire for freedom and the constraints of Kyrgyz culture, Sezim desperately seeks a way out.
Ala Kachuu is your typical foreign language entry into the Academy Awards shorts competition. Its purpose is to show that something bad happens every day somewhere in the world that you never knew of. In this case, most viewers probably haven’t heard of Kyrgyzstan, or its fiercely patriarchal society, but on seeing it, you’ll probably become pretty angry about a culture you knew next to nothing about. Luckily, this one isn’t 100% misery porn, as the lead never loses hope of changing her life. It also captures the city and countryside well and builds tension effectively as Sezim plots her escape. – RS
On My Mind (Denmark)
One morning, gloomy Henrik enters a bar and spots a karaoke machine. He has to sing a song to his wife and it has to be right now.
On My Mind is a heavily sentimental film with a twist that is pretty obvious from the start. The grumpy bar-owner kick-starts a pantomime situation, by refusing to let Henrik sing. There’s a bit of ‘will he-won’t he’ before Henrik finally reveals the emotional burden he’s obviously carrying. The reveal feels manipulative, because we’re expecting it and it’s being held back from us deliberately to provoke emotion. So when it lands, it’s sad, but equally frustrating, hindering the intended payoff. – RS
Please Hold (U.S.)
In an America that has become fully automated, Mateo, a young Latino man is arrested by a police drone without explanation. He’s locked up in a detention center fully manned by bots and the familiar call center AI we’ve all had trouble with. To get out, he has to navigate the computerized bureaucracy of the privatized American justice system, in search of an actual human being to set things right.
If you’ve ever been caught in the bureaucracy of the state, you’ll be able to sympathize with Mateo’s misfortune. Like Black Mirror, Please Hold taps into the collective unease of the modern world by looking at the intended and unintended consequences of new technologies – in this case a fully automated society and growing police state. However, it does it with a little more humor, and without a complete lack of hope, making it a more easy-going watch. Plus it has a satirized version of Microsoft’s annoying paperclip helper. Please Hold manages to lightly criticize the carceral system without feeling completely tone-deaf like last year’s Two Distant Strangers. -RS
The Dress (Poland)
Julia toils away at a rundown motel in rural Poland as a maid. In the monotony of life, she starts fantasizing about a truck driver that occasionally visits and the possibility of ending her loneliness.
The Dress may just be the most depressing short of the Live-Action section. As whilst the protagonists of Ala Kachuu and On My Mind have hope or achieve some form of closure, Julia is stuck in an endless limbo of work and prejudice. Just when you think life might be looking up for her as she comes out of her shell, her hopes are completely shot, bringing her self-esteem crashing down. I’m hoping the Academy picked this short because of the lead performance and well-constructed dreary aesthetic and not for the misery porn factor common in a lot of the Academy Award nominees. -RS
The Long Goodbye (U.K.)
Riz and his family are in the middle of preparing a wedding celebration when a white supremacist group arrives in their neighborhood.
This shortwas released back in 2020 alongside Riz Ahmed’s ‘The Long Goodbye’ hip hop album. Like the music, the short goes hard on post-Brexit Britain and the rise of the far-right movements. It’s quick, and builds intimacy, and later chaos, through rapid cutting, fast-paced dialogue, and movement. It’s designed to feel authentic and it succeeds in selling it to an audience perhaps familiar with British white supremacist hate groups from films such as This is England, the Small Axe series, or Blinded by the Light. It concludes powerfully with spoken word to make this year’s most powerful protest entry. -RS
The Latinx Inclusion fellowship was created last year by LALIFF to increase opportunities for underrepresented groups within the Latino community. Each of the Afro Latino and Indigenous Latino directors selected for the fellowship were granted $20k to produce a short and each one premiered at LALIFF 2022. Here’s a quick review of 9 of the 10 brilliant short films, which span a variety of topics from sexuality to race across the drama, comedy, and fantasy genres.
The Afro-Latino Directed Shorts
Somos De Aqui
Somos de Aqui is a love story between a Haitian-Dominican man and a Dominican woman set within the racist immigration policies of the Dominican Republic. One is waiting for their visa to return to the U.S. whilst the other fears deportation to an unknown country.
The best part of Somos de Aqui is the love story. The chemistry between the two leads had me smiling all the way through. I even felt a bit cheated by the short run time of the movie and the political ending, as it meant we couldn’t see more of their growing relationship (and more of the Dominican Republic). However, that’s kind of the point of the movie – you’re meant to be sucked into the love story so you’re disappointed by the ending. It makes you hate the racist policies in the Dominican Republic as it cut this romance short. That being said, I’d love to see a full feature love story from this director in the future.
Hoar
When a phone sex operator is accepted into a Ph.D program across the globe, she must confront her devout Catholic mother, with her difficult decision.
Like many of the films in the Latinx Inclusion fellowship, Hoar centers on family relationships. They’re integral to the plotand the character development of the short. The parents represent tradition and home, whilst the lead is trying to find and differentiate themself as a separate entity from their family. Hoar also feels like a stage play adaptation, because of the heavy dialogue, absence of sound, and one-location set. Both the stage-play style and seen before narrative feel a bit too same-y even with the great Afro-Latina lead.
Sin Raices
A recently adopted 8-year-old refugee spends a day preparing for her first red carpet appearance with her new pop star mother.
The mother-daughter relationship in Sin Raices feels deliberately awkward. Partly because they’re adjusting to each other’s company, but mostly because the daughter isn’t made to feel at home. Her new mother opts to spoil her instead of spending time with her and dresses her up to be an accessory to her look instead of protecting her from the limelight and allowing her to grow. The daughter’s lack of dialogue only furthers how she’s fetishized for her indigenous appearance and heritage by her new mother. Sin Raices highlights how indigenous identity is appropriated to the detriment of the very alive indigenous communities in the Americas.
Daughter of the Sea
After the death of her grandfather, a young woman experiences a spiritual awakening when she is called by Yemaya, the orisha Goddess of the Sea.
Featuring a great performance from Princess Nokia, Daughter of the Sea is a homecoming for a lonely pop star. Like the reconnection felt by the Dominican woman in Somos de Aqui, Princess Nokia’s Puerto Rican homecoming allows her to reconnect to her heritage and country through her mother’s spirituality. The lush green forests and sea turn the country into a visual paradise and her rustic family home and the warmth from being close to her family make everything feel like home. Especially in contrast to the cold glass-filled empty home of hers in Los Angeles. It shows that home is where your family is; Yemaya’s calling her is just the icing on the top.
Bodies Will Tumble And Fall
When a dysfunctional BIPOC cheer squad are sent to the woods to settle their differences, they must learn to become a team to save their coach from serial killers.
Bodies Will Tumble and Fall revels in the dumb entertainment of B-movie slashers. It plays on stereotypes as well as horror genre tropes to create an enjoyable, if silly and random, comedy. Unless you’re completely against cringy humor, you’ll find this appealing.
The Indigenous Latino Directed Shorts
Gabriela
In Gabriela, a young undocumented Guatemalan woman dreams of joining a Country Club swim team in the Southern States of America. She’s stuck between two worlds; striving for the American Dream for citizens and the American Dream that brought her undocumented mother to the country. The citizen’s American Dream is what she’s been brought up to believe in, by her education and neighbors. However, she’s boxed into the latter – forced to follow in her mother’s footsteps as a maid because of her undocumented status.
Her identity crisis is beautifully shown through her ‘alone time’- particularly in scenes with Gabriela swimming in the pool. In the water, she’s in her zone and can’t be disturbed by white neighbors, country club attendants, or her mother, reminding her of who she can and cannot be. The water doesn’t judge and gives her the time from everyone else to become her own person.
Heritage
Rumiñahui appears to be the perfect son and brother. He’s made the effort to spend time with both parents and helps to raise his younger brother, teaching him their heritage he proudly carries. The only thing he hides from his family is his sexuality.
Heritage is a coming out gone wrong story. Whilst there is a quick documentary interlude that highlights a heritage of homosexuality in Pre-Colombian society, the focus of this short is on the unfortunate anti-LGBTQ+ reaction of Rumi’s parents (as foreshadowed in the opening scene). Heritage uses prejudice to shock the audience, a bit like the swimming pool scenes in Gabriela. In this case it distracts a little from the nice character building work and interesting links to indigenous heritage from earlier in the movie, even if it’s purpose is to highlight an unfortunate reality.
Raul Playing Game
When Raul accidentally double books himself with a date with a woman and a man at the same time in the same place, two animated inner voices take over.
Raul Playing Game uses the time-loop and Inside Outtropes to turn an embarrassing situation into a cringy slapstick comedy. Whilst the situation feels unlikely, there’s definitely some fun in the video-game style dating scenario that evokes nostalgia for The Sims as well as the modern gamification of dating thanks to apps like Tinder. And despite the flashy style, that bounces between animation and live action, it contains a solid moral message for everyone.
The Record
Set in the 1930’s, Zack and his sick brother are left at home in the remote American West as their father ventures out for medicine. All they have for company is a magic phonograph that holds memories of their mother.
This short feels a lot like Bless Me, Ultima. It appears to be set in the same period with similar set design and costumes, and features unpredictable ghosts and magic that both haunt and protect the two brothers. It’s not clear why Zack’s brother fell ill or why the phonograph must keep playing, but it probably has something to do with their dead mother who they still hold dear many years later. The Record is a quaint tale that will probably make you thankful that you don’t like in a humble and remote electricity-less abode in the 1930s.
All of the 9 shorts we got to see as part of LALIFF 2022 are worth seeking out online in the next few months. We’re excited to see what these directors do next.
For more from LALIFF, check out last years reviews in the LALIFF 2021 Hub.
Watching the 2023 Oscar shorts is the quickest and easiest way to get closer to watching all of the Oscar contenders. So if you’re looking for something to say about the Academy Awards this week, check these short films out at cinemas near you.
The Animated 2023 Oscar Shorts
An Ostrich Told Me the World is Fake and I Think I Believe It (Australia)
Neil (Pendragon himself) works at a computer doing… something. He finds himself on the daily commute to his office from… somewhere. There’s always a deadline and schedule to meet at the corporation of… mysterious account. Luckily, Neil finds therapeutic understanding in an office ostrich (John Cavanagh), who reveals to him much of what the audience already understands: the fourth wall is what keeps Neil from his destiny, a life unfettered from the benign banality of… some such.
The strangest among the crop of this year’s nominees—usually a feat within itself, but here even more so—An Ostrich colludes camera trickery and unexplained plot thickening to the benefit of anyone wondering how stop motion became so relevant in today’s industry again. Pendragon maintains his win for the Australian Student Academy Award for the short, a sign of creative breakthrough, if not some trust from a system ready to hold their faith above the absurd. For his inventive framing and perceptions, further recognition for Pendragon wouldn’t be unwarranted. -ST
Ice Merchants (Portugal)
Doing more with silence than the rest of this year’s dialogue-minimal shorts combined, Gonzalez’s artistic depiction of father-son relationships at their brink is a tragedy bred from circumstances beyond our comprehension. Curiously isolated from their matriarch, the two undergo a baffling daily routine: freezing water from atop their lofty cliffside home, plummeting down to merchandise in the valley town below, and steadily making their way back up for supper and sleep. This goes on until powers beyond their own force a spontaneous break from habit.
Gonzalez won this year’s Annie Award for Best Short Subject, a notice of interest to the Academy’s voters as beneficial as any. Ice Merchants will go down with or without the Oscar as one of the most lauded short films in the program’s history, running the festival circuit mercilessly from a deliriously colorful skypoint. Yet the short, more clever than it ever leads its hand with, emotionally seals a justified landing even when all seems lost; maybe it could do so on Oscar night just the same. -ST
My Year of Dicks (U.S.)
Screenwriter Pamela Ribon, noted for her work on Moana and Ralph Breaks the Internet, recounts a tumultuous time of her youth growing up in 1990s Houston. As the title implies, Pam (Brie Tilton) has to go through the shapes, shades, warts and wont’s of securing an appointment to lose her virginity at age 15. Nearly everything that can comedically go wrong does, along with the sprinklings of interactions with the worst vibe checks boys of the Gen X era can muster.
Like the teenage transition to womanhood, My Year of Dicks is, at times, appropriately excruciating. Originally conceived for episodic broadcast on FX, Gunnarsdóttir mixes visual styles not unlike an experimental web series would, drawing from anime and Adult Swim alike. My Year of Dicks, humorously landing its place in Oscar history by name alone, won’t receive more appreciation than it already commands – but a cute story, wrapped tightly in a bow near invisible in the making, goes a long way when the promised entertainment is begotten by just the sheer mention of, ahem, “Dicks.” -ST
The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse (U.K.)
Starting from the beginning, a boy (Jude Coward Nicoll) and a mole (Tom Hollander) find solace in each other’s company – snow encasing anything they know familiar, stuck in the outside to look for simple comforts. From there joins an untame fox and a curiously mythical horse. Slowly, by biblical pace more so than by weariness, the boy and his growing cohort of creatures set off to discover a home they seem to know nothing about, acknowledging their victory sign may be no clearer than their starting post, dashed and covered in a layer of snowed-out ambiguity.
Based on Mackesy’s own children’s book illustrations, the Apple TV+ short submission goes a long way for voters simply judging by its cover alone. Evoking the charismatic comforts of Winnie the Pooh better the most animated products of the last half century, Baynton and Mackesy find established ground in weening all the self-important hagiographic sayings they can out of the playbook, a 32-minute short denser on morality principles than animal tendencies. If that sounds outside the banner of trustworthy quality, then you’ve found yourself outside the voting body, which lauded the film heavily at this year’s Annie Awards for frontrunning commendation. -ST
The Flying Sailor (Canada)
Animation is far from the only field in which the incomprehensible can be submitted as fact, but it certainly is one of the more audacious options. In the collision of 2D and 3D effects, a story is brought forth a century later – the impact of two fully-barged shipping vessels in Halifax 1917 that caused an impromptu explosion so large, it defied physics and deductive reasoning. A lone sailor, sent coursing miles into the sky, landed near naked, bodily, fully intact in a neighboring district.
For all its duration spent in the heavens above Nova Scotia, The Flying Sailor is capriciously shallow, a work of blanketed humor that singes one of the most traumatic events in recorded Canadian history down to a portly man, flailing nude with exposed penis, silhouetting overhead an endless mass of clouded smoke. It truly does not get more symbolic or understated than that – and so there is little else to note. -ST
The Documentary 2023 Oscar Shorts
Haulout (U.K.)
In this year’s requisite piece of climate change pleading, the siblings Arbugaev film scientist Maxim Chakilev on his journey through the Russian arctic, treading along sheets of ice and terrain in search of the titular ‘haulout’ – a rare, though predictable phenomenon months in the making that roots all of Maxim’s biological studies in a habitat changing before his eyes.
What appears at first to be the account of a northern hermit eventually reveals itself to be a very surreal account of elder traditions continuing in an ecosystem that may not allow them for much longer. Haulout hinges on the reveal of its premise, a uniquely-played shift in tone so sudden it borders on outrageously funny. The surprise is the documentary’s key element – in today’s world, so much scientific warning can only warrant so much shock at the incitement of worsening conditions, even at the furthest reaches of what one could mistake for civilization. ‘They’ don’t seem to happy about the sudden shift of things either… -ST
How Do You Measure a Year (U.S.)
From ages two through 18, experimental filmmaker Rosenblatt films his daughter on the same couch, with the same medium-close camera angle, asking her a script of half-broadstroke, half-maudlin questions concerning personal life, existentialist ideas, future aspirations and youthful tendencies. How Do You Measure a Year? takes a “Rent” quote and uses it to capitalize on an idea any parent would find fun and engaging – to reject nihilism by means of documenting their child’s mental state in real time, a project born out of either a hyperfixed, uncool philosophy, or boredom. One assumes with this filmmaker it’s the former.
Rosenblatt was here last year with one of the most intrepidly thickheaded Oscar shorts in recent memory, When We Were Bullies. His follow-up release doesn’t carry nearly the same broken stigma of a man who can’t read what he’s putting on paper, though it does leave one to wonder why such nuttiness continues unabated. For every incredibly useless question Rosenblatt posits (asking his toddler about societal power), the value of How Do You Measure a Year? seems to come back around, ending on a sentimental going-away note that Rosenblatt surely didn’t predict – for he can’t see the future even half as well as his daughter can evoke the values of the present. -ST
Stranger at the Gate (U.S.)
Seftel takes a camera to Mac McKinney, a war veteran framed as the epitome of anti-terrorism succumbing to his own demons. A former U.S. Marine, Mac details the internal horrors the foreign battlefront left him with, a relentless need to silence the residents of a local mosque, people for which he can see no other face besides the ones the American government has taught him to hate for chapters of his familial growth and defensive experience.
Stranger at the Gate may be among the most controversial of this year’s short film entries, for nothing more than its indecisive carefree inhabitance of ‘we-are-the-world’ hand-holding. Mac McKinney, a burly figure with tattoos aplenty, is given incredible narrative force to speak his mind, often with confounding truthfulness. This is the story of a soldier’s settling moments with his own consciousness, and not so much a lament of the systems that got him there. Where religious freedoms care to spread, Stranger at the Gate is not an assurance that local communities are really following. -ST
The Elephant Whisperers (India)
Bomman and Belli are a loving couple who hold a heralded status in South India, recognized for their skillful tract and familiarity with local wildlife, exotic and unbecoming as they emerge. The Elephant Whisperers focuses on their relationship with one particular orphan Raghu, a curious boy of assumed intelligence who grows resiliently under their protective care. Whether Raghu establishes lived-in roots as one of his own kind is another question, Bomman and Belli taking it upon themselves to prove an ecological service unheard of to their indigenous communities.
The Elephant Whisperers benefits from its cinematography more than anything, decorated production value relayed in the capturing of effervescent colors, splendid close-ups of the childlike mammals in the reserve, guiding a perspective that comes across as more relatable and illuminating to the relationship of pet and owner than Hollywood has been capable of recreating in years past. Don’t let the Netflix-branding fool you from Gonsalves’ cinematic depiction of comforting sensibility, a brokered chronicle of man and animal that alleviates much worry that this year’s documentary field will emotionally overwhelm more than it will sympathize and engross. -ST
The Martha Mitchell Effect (U.S.)
The wife of John Mitchell, the Attorney General and campaign manager for President Richard Nixon, would never tolerate being so simply referred to as just ‘the wife of an Attorney General.’ Martha held esteem through her incredibly vocal appearances, on the press cycles and the talk show circuit alike, speaking her mind aligned to the Republican majority only in shucked responsibility. For Martha was a stronger tabloid than Nixon could even control, embedding herself into the Watergate scandal for better or worse, a woman whose job was never to keep the peace when such unscrupulous leaders were present.
Netflix’s The Martha Mitchell Effect could very easily be mistaken for a network TV expose, if not for the documentary’s consistently enamored takes of Martha’s visage. What Alvergue & McClutchy’s short lacks in political treatise toward anything that couldn’t be found in the most listened-to Spotify podcasts, it mostly accounts for by keeping Martha front-and-center, a figure of emotional and understandable stock, who fought for her beliefs in spite of a politically-dealt decade that would consistently let her down. Whistleblowers have been recounted with more inspiration in recent years, but one could do worse for stories of emblazoned righteousness. -ST
The Live Action 2023 Oscar Shorts
An Irish Goodbye (Ireland)
Following the untimely death of their mother, a young man with Down syndrome and his estranged brother discover her unfulfilled bucket list.
Maybe this will be helped by all the voters who liked Banshees of Inisherin, but not enough to rank it in their first few spots. An Irish Goodbye, has a lot of fecks, moaning, and dry humor. It also has two more great Irish names in Turlough and Lorcan – ironic considering it was directed by a Tom and a Ross. However, despite it’s attempt to balance dark humor and warm feelings, it ends up a bit too saccharine. – RS
Ivalu (Denmark)
Ivalu is gone. Her little sister is desperate to find her and her father does not care. The vast Greenlandic nature holds secrets. Where is Ivalu?
Interestingly, Ivalu is co-directed the director behind Greenland’s first feature film directed by a woman, Anori, which we’ve previously reviewed for FilmRoot. Ivalu also contains a mystery enhanced by the harsh but beautiful Greenlandic landscape. However, it also carries some of Anori‘s flaws – the flashbacks of Ivalu cut with snippets of her sister searching for her, never build up enough suspense for the predictable pay-off. -RS
Le Pupille (Italy, U.S.)
Le Pupille brings you into a Catholic Orphanage during Christmas in the height of the Second World War. Despite the frugal times and strict Mother Superior, the girls find joy in a few magical scenes reminiscent of the wonder of early cinema.
In the Catholic Orphanage, objects are a scarcity. Unlike the often stuffy materialism of today’s modern world, the girls in Le Pupille live in large rooms with very few things around them. The frugality in front of the camera is also seen in the film’s production. Le Pupille was shot completely on film, and therefore all of the special effects are completely VFX free. This gives the film a playful magic that feels like the wonder of the Melies’ silent films. In one scene a baby appears out of thin air (from one shot to the next), whilst a freeze-framed shouting Mother Superior conveys shock from what feels like the kids perspective in another. It’s this simplicity both in front of the camera (with the limited objects and distractions) and behind the camera (in the production process) that makes this short Christmas film feel playful. -RS
Night Ride (Norway)
Night Ride is another Christmas short (I guess Academy members binge their shorts over the Holiday season). It’s premise is mildly amusing: Ebba unwittingly hi-jacks a tram and decides to play out the role of tram driver. However, it quickly takes a very un-festive turn. Just as we’re enjoying some laid back humor, a trans-woman is assaulted right under our noses. Then in an uncomfortable 180, our lead character becomes a ‘hero’ for ‘identifying’ with the assaulted woman.
It’s a shame, because Night Ride starts off pretty humorously. It could have been an enjoyable festive short, but instead chose to use transphobia as a tool to develop the character of the cisgender lead. -RS
The Red Suitcase (Luxembourg)
A veiled 16 year old Iranian teenager is terrified to take her red suitcase from the carousel at the Luxembourg Airport for fear of being identified by her fiancé. Her fear grows with every second in the face of what awaits her beyond the gate.
Like Riz Ahmed’s The Long Goodbye (last year’s winner), Cyrus Neshvad’s The Red Suitcase does a great job of plunging you into a situation and ramping up the tension quickly. It’s not initially clear what the girl is afraid of. The film doesn’t waste time telling you who she is, where she is, or where she’s come from. Instead we learn bits about her through the action. It’s pure chase-thriller and has no excess in its tight 17 minute run time. -RS
Watching the 2024 Oscar shorts is the quickest and easiest way to get closer to watching all of the Oscar contenders. So if you’re looking for something to say about this year’s Academy Awards, check out these short films at cinemas near you.
The Animated 2024 Oscar Shorts
Letter to a Pig (Israel)
Divided into two halves, the Animation Is Film Festival winner follows a Holocaust survivor’s story to a classroom of primarily ungrateful students, mocking his age and confounding seriousness when discussing his friendship to an unnamed pig. Slowly, the story shrinks to the focus of Alma, one schoolgirl who breaks the film into high fantasy – a torturous dream that evokes the cruel mob mentality of the past.
The average animation viewer will put a lot of prestige on the more creative visual displays, those films that take place in a dimension unseen to human eyes, whether it be felt or caricature. Letter to a Pig may not be the single most creative concept in the running this year, but it is the most immediately stunning – live action footage overdrawn with an extreme amount of minimalist line drawing. That minimalism, its biggest asset, is unfortunately quickly trumped by a dogged amalgamation of trauma and historical setbacks, resulting in more curiosity than rousing passion. -ST
Ninety-Five Senses (U.S.)
Coy is a senior citizen reflecting on the power and nostalgia that his five primary senses have brought him presented in a curiously dark order. Voiced by Tim Blake Nelson, Coy plays along with a chronology of significant events in his life, milestones marked by entertainment, love, ambition and eventually, death.
The Hess pair of directors & writers, using their Oscar nomination to eclipse their Napoleon Dynamite fame before piloting the upcoming Minecraft adaptation, have created something special with Ninety-Five Senses, a shockingly dramatic story that revels equally in its diverse and various styles of hand-drawn animation as it does its dramaturgy. While fishing for emotion where the wandering tales of an old man seem silly at best, the Hess’ make a sincere and effective plea for compassion and forgiveness within one’s own perspective, a deceiving victory if this year’s short film lineup needed at least one to speak for. -ST
Our Uniform (Iran)
Following a bit of unique structural storytelling, Our Uniform unravels a traditional Iranian schoolgirl’s daily attire to discuss the conventions that present with a young woman’s own identity. By taking the shirt, label, sleeve and linings bit-by-bit, colors and patterns reveal a creative tapestry by which the unnamed narrator contemplates her own femininity while dissecting what details about her past marked her outer shell most permanently.
At seven minutes, Our Uniform is the shortest Oscar nominee at this year’s induction, though an argument could made that it is also the prettiest – the carry-on textures Moghaddam uses to bring the girls themselves into their own environment, a schoolhouse or a road along which to travel, is immediately captivating. Naturally, with such briefness some a slight narrative, Our Uniform ending on more of a mid-sentence brushaway than anything resembling a punctuating note of contemplation. It is, simply, brief and honest, a meditation on time that has very little of it to spare. -ST
Pachyderme (France)
A young girl named Louise spends a routine summer with her grandparents, playing on swing sets and swimming in the local lagoon. Her small figure is stiff and roughed, overwhelmed by huge locks of hair that gives Louise a fairy-like physicality, matching the ethereal wonder of her painted world. Louise reveals that she thinks a lot about monsters, one in particular, who haunts her holiday trip, disrupting her innocent countryside summer.
Pachyderm is a deeply interesting, though uncompelling, experiment for the same reasons that make its nomination so intrinsic. It feels as though every year at least one animated short beckons a darker form of animation serving as trauma vehicle, small-form character arcs already knee-deep in an uncompromising past. A struggle with subtlety erupts in Pachyderm, the delicacy of Louise’s life at odds with her vague notions to disassociate. Where terrifying stories of childhood instability often layer into the hurt of residual mental warfare, Clément’s route is dark and lonely, a small light in an otherwise clouded vision. -ST
War is Over! Inspired by the Music of John & Yoko (U.S.)
On opposite trenches at the climax of World War I, two frontline soldiers for the unnamed sides spread their free time out with the least leisurely round of chess ever played. By sending a carrier pigeon back-and-forth without their superiors’ knowledge, the two engage in a bout of metaphors, the escalation of their own board game matching the severity of the embattlements supressing their allies just outside their doors.
With a production credit by Sean Ono Lennon, WAR IS OVER! may win the Oscar on sheer starpower alone. The traces of the short’s development and press tour even go back to herald Peter Jackson, with Unreal animation done by his partner-owned Wētā FX Limited. It makes perfect sense, then, that WAR IS OVER! is easily the most treacly short of the animated roster, a laughable sentiment gone wrong that peace can overcome anything – or, at least that the power of Christmas, when John Lennon is the baron of tidings, is stronger than thought and diplomacy (if you want it). -ST
The Documentary 2024 Oscar Shorts
ABC’s Of Book Banning (U.S.)
Over 2,000 books have been removed from school districts in the U.S. The ABC’s of Book Banning follows the human toll the future will pay for depriving children of their right to read and learn about a complex world. Interviews with children and authors shed light on this ongoing dangerous precedent.
An important message made for screen with the elegance of a PowerPoint slide, ABC’s of Book Banning tries and fails to live up to the urgency and creativity that influencer-activists convey on TikTok. This documentary short interviews recognizable names (Judy Blume, Amanda Gorman) with cute kids, including one with a luscious mullet, to tell us that book banning is bad. Unfortunately, there’s little interest in the interviewees beyond snappy headline quotes, and the same surface-level overview emanates from the films slap-dash presentation. Despite the potential fodder of the polarizing subject, this is arguably the worst short of the bunch. -RS
Island In Between (Taiwan)
The islands of Kinmen sit as a barred entryway for the Taiwanese people to the Chinese mainland, a beachside land of sand and honey that serves as a focal point in the history of the Chinese Civil War. Remnants of that history soak in the seawater while the skyscrapers of modern China loom just miles away, visible over the horizon, as a symbol of the continued tension and growing disparity between the two nations, or so it would visually seem.
As cursory as they come, Island in Between might be the lightest and most immediately forgettable documentary in this year’s nominee pool, an already congested pipeline of nonfiction blandness. Like a teaser for something bigger and greater, Chiang’s story relies heavily on the immediate reliability of his subjects, their island fever boiled into something more sustained, a sunken propaganda-state they know no bounds from. For Island in Between to work, so must the direct shift to the political perspective of the mainland, a porthole Chiang’s film simply doesn’t seem to have the time for. -ST
Nai Nai & Wai Po (U.S.)
Sean Wang’s two grandmothers live in the same household, the best of friends – one from his maternal side, one paternal. They share in most everything together, co-opting each others lives as their own responsibilities for upkeep in this new post-pandemic world they’ve found themselves. With no left to care for otherwise, Wang’s Nai Nai and his Wài Pó confront the rest of their time together with love, fear, and comical sincerity.
Wang gained an immense amount of timely attention for his Sundance Award-winning feature debut Didi, which rose in profile around the same time his short received Oscar attention. It should be noticed, however, that Nai Nai & Wài Pó nonetheless stands as the least tedious of this year’s documentary shorts. Wang is easily able to immortalize his grandmothers’ wisdom and humor within the short’s brief runtime, a contemplation on the inevitabilities of life and beyond that speaks without hesitation to the reality we find ourselves in at the final crossroads – not alone, and absolutely not unfulfilled. -ST
The Barber of Little Rock (U.S.)
The Barber of Little Rock explores America’s widening racial wealth gap through the story of Arlo Washington, a self-made businessman who founds a non-profit bank to uplift a community that has been largely excluded from the financial engines that create wealth.
A pleasing documentary about a man set on uplifting his community – first through the barber occupation, and secondly adapting to a traditionally inhospitable banking community. The portrayal of the protagonists is so positive that it toes the hagiographic line, making you feel a bit skeptical of the many hugs and charitable grants Washington issues to community members on film; “is it all just for the camera?.” This isn’t helped by the style of the documentary which recalls the same inspirational lens flares over-used by political nominees in their TV campaigns. Skepticism aside, the message is an important one and a sign that the traditionally conservative Academy board is evolving. -RS
The Last Repair Shop (U.S.)
The most effective of this year’s doc shorts at giving perspective to the lower class (though, ironically, also the most well-funded courtesy of Searchlight Pictures), The Last Repair Shop dives anthologically into the backgrounds of four supervising craftsmen who maintain the host of instruments used by children across the Los Angeles Unified School District. In the reaches of downtown LA, all four subjects relate their own upbringing to the value they place in music education, both as a tool for extracurricular guidance and the harmonious lives they lead as experts in a career built on service to underrepresented parts of the community.
Bowers has been on a hot streak recognizable to even the most unsavvy Oscar voters – aside from his original score work on Green Book and The Color Purple, he was previously nominated in this same category for A Concerto Is a Conversation, a documentary that distilled the creator’s own legacy as a composer and instrumentalist into the lineage of Hollywood’s history far beyond his own. The Last Repair Shop, a semi-apparent sequel, ties its subjects even more succinctly than Concerto, a more diverse ensemble remarkable not only for earning their career-driven stripes but from how eclectic those stripes are in unison, coming together in uplifting & wonderfully empathetic fashion. -ST
The Live Action 2024 Oscar Shorts
The After (U.K.)
David Oyelowo finds himself in one of the most overly-dramatic Live Action shorts of recent times as we watch him unfold his range of emotions to a cheesy choice of backing tracks.
The After starts off in familiar territory; a father connecting with his daughter, but takes a wildly dramatic turn in an instant. The randomness of the sudden tonal shift is like reading a story written by a kid that has just discovered the art of story-telling; “I like the sand-pit and SHARKS ARE EATING THE FISH.” It’s worth watching for the comic effect the set-up unintentionally produces. To the film’s credit, it does recover the mood for a few scenes in which Oyelowo is silent. Missed calls and everyday conversations symbolize his loneliness. However, the film tries to outdo the dramatic start with an equally dramatic ending, bringing an awkwardly in-your-face crescendo succeeded by a awkwardly comforting song choice. Is this a secret comedy? – RS
Invincible (Canada)
Inspired by a true story, Invincible recounts the last 48 hours in the life of Marc-Antoine Bernier, a 14-year-old boy on a desperate quest for freedom.
Invincible feels very similar to the films of Xavier Dolan (I Killed My Mother, Mommy). All feature unruly teenagers situated in Francophone Canada struggling with their parents and themselves. The grainy, slightly faded look of the film combined with the abundance of nature emphasizes their angst. There’s too much natural physical space around them to make themselves feel significant. Invincible is an unusual pick for the Academy Awards, but a worthy one. It’s well-made and captures the unsettled mind of young Marc-Antoine authentically, even if the style and subject matter isn’t wholly fresh. – RS
Knight of Fortune (Denmark)
The loss of a loved one, the grief, the risk of yellow skin, and a coffin, this is too much for Karl to face. It is much easier to fix a broken lamp. A chance encounter with a stranger will help him face his pain.
Surprisingly, the makers behind Knight of Fortune have no apparent connection to the last Danish Live Action Short nominee, On My Mind (maybe there are just a lot of loyal Danish filmmakers on the voting committee). Both are about widowers confronting their grief in unique ways – On My Mind with karaoke and Knight of Fortune with an intriguing stranger. Knight of Fortune is better than On My Mind. Firstly, it’s not manipulatively holding back a reveal, and secondly it’s odd-ball humor comes much more naturally with the chemistry between the two leads. – RS
Red, White, and Blue (U.S.)
Rachel is a single parent living paycheck to paycheck. When an unexpected pregnancy threatens to unravel her already precarious position, she’s forced to cross state lines in search of an abortion.
Heavily influenced by Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Always, this follows another woman that heads on the road in search of abortion rights. It has a similarly grainy look and even the lead actors look similar. However, Red, White, and Blue hides an ace in its hand in the third act. It’s an ace that gives the short its oomph, but also leans into the extreme to convey a simple message; abortion rights should be protected. – RS
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (U.K.)
A Road Dahl story about a rich man who learns about a guru who can see without using his eyes and then sets out to master the skill in order to cheat at gambling.
The A-List short of this year’s nominees. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar features Benedict Cumberbatch, Ralph Fiennes, Dev Patel, Ben Kingsley, and Richard Ayoade. It’s also directed by Wes Anderson, who surprisingly, has never won an Oscar. As the clear favorite, this might be the way he finally gets his Oscar recognition, and it would be deservingly so. It features the trademark Wes Anderson style – heavily curated production design and color schemes, with quirky storytelling – but is backed by quality source material from a bonafide story-teller. This is the Oscar shorts; we’ve seen Two Distant Strangers knock out Oscar Isaac, but surely this is Wes Anderson’s time. -RS
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