Daily post 21 Nov 2009 02:38 am
Shorts Short List
The Renaissance Masters – 4 will conclude tomorrow, Sunday.
- There have been a number of newspaper articles about the released short list of Academy Award entrees for Best Documentary. Many of the more popular films – such as Michael Moore’s Capitalism: a love story and The September Issue – have been left off the list. This has caused some feedback for the Academy.
The short list of entrees for the Best Animated Feature film has also gotten a lot of attention in newpapers and on blogs. A record 20 films have been entered and are probably eligible – meaning there may be as many as 5 nominees this year.
The Academy has never previously released the short list of the nominees for the Best Animated Short.
Until today.
These are the ten films vying for the Oscar nomination for that award. They’re listed below in alphabetical order by title, with their director and production company:
The Cat Piano
Eddie White and Ari Gibson, directors (The People’s Republic of Animation)
French Roast
Fabrice O. Joubert, director (Pumpkin Factory/Bibo Films)
Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty
Nicky Phelan, director, and Darragh O’Connell, producer (Brown Bag Films)
The Kinematograph
Tomek Baginski, director-producer (Platige Image)
The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte)
Javier Recio Gracia, director (Kandor Graphics and Green Moon)
Logorama
Nicolas Schmerkin, producer (Autour de Minuit)
A Matter of Loaf and Death
Nick Park, director (Aardman Animations Ltd.)
Partly Cloudy
Peter Sohn, director (Pixar Animation Studios)
Runaway
Cordell Barker, director (National Film Board of Canada)
Varieté
Roelof van den Bergh, director (il Luster Productions)
The following were all of the films that were eligible and competed for the short list. Congratulations to all for having produced films of such high calibre.
1. GETTING OVER HIM IN 8 SONGS OR LESS – 28mins – Debra Solomon
2. KANIZSA HILL – 8min – Evelyn Lee
3. ALICE’S ATTIC – 3mins – Robyn Yannoukos
4. HE’S BARACK OBAMA – 2mins – JibJab
5. SEBASTIAN’S VOODOO – 4mins – Joaquin Baldwin
6. THE KINEMATOGRAPH – 12ins – Tomek BagiÅ„ski
7. HORN DOG – 5mins – Bill Plympton
8. VARIETÉ – 5mins – Roelof van den Bergh
9. ALMA – 6mins – Rodrigo Blaas
10. BIRTH – 12mins – Signe Bauman
11. CAGES – 10mins – Juan Jose Medina
12. CHROMA CHAMELEON – 5mins – Marc F. Adler & Warren Grubb
13. ClKORJA AN’ KAFE (Chicory ‘n Coffee) – 8mins – Dusan Kastelic
14. ESTERHAZY – 23min – Izabela Plucinska
15. JACINTA Р9mins РKarla Casta̱eda
16. LA INCREJBLE HISTORIA DEL HOMBRE SIN SOMBRA Р9mins РJos̩ Esteban Alenda
17. LEONARDO -10mins – Jim Capobianco
18. LIVE MUSIC – 6mins – Hugh Hart
19. LOGORAMA – 17mins – H5, a French design collective,
20. A MATTER OF LOAF AN DEATH – 29mins – Nick Park
21. PARTLY CLOUDY – 6mins – Peter Sohn
22. PATIENCE OF THE MEMORY – 7mins – Vuk Jevremovic
23. PIGEON: IMPOSSIBLE – 6mins – Lucas Martell
24. RINKY DINK – 5mins – John Dilworth
26. RUNAWAY – 9mins – Cordell Barker
26. SLAVES – AN ANIMATED DOCUMENTARY – 15mins – David Aronowitsch & Hanna Heilborn
27. THE SPINE – 11mins – Chris Landreth
28. TABLE FELLOWSHIP – 2mins – Robert Colon
29. VALISE – 7mins – Isabelle Favez
30. VIVE LA ROSE -5mins – Bruce Alcock
31. WHEN APPLES ROLL -7mins – Reinis Kalnaellis
32, YOU’RE OUTA HERE – 3mins – George Griffin
33. THE BIRTHDAY GIFT – 8mins –
34. THE CAT PIANO – 8mins – Eddie White & Ari Gibson
35. FRENCH ROAST – 8mins – Fabrice O. Joubert
36. THE LADY AND THE REAPER (La Dama y La Muerte) – 8mins – Javier Recio
37. GRANNY O’GRIMM’S SLEEPING BEAUTY – 6 mins – Nicky Phelan
Short Films and Feature Animation Branch members will now select the five nominees from among the 10 titles on the shortlist. Branch screenings will be held in Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco in January 2010. The 82nd Academy Awards nominations will be announced on Tuesday, February 2, 2010, at 8:30 a.m. EST in the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater.
Thanks to Karl Cohen for the information.
on 21 Nov 2009 at 12:06 pm 1.Tim Rauch said …
Thanks for sharing!
The Oscars seem to me like “one more film festival” and I’m not sure how much weight the award should really have. Still, it’s the highest profile award for an animated short in the US, maybe in the world. It’s fun to know who’s playing that game.
Though I haven’t seen all of them, my pick would be “Runaway”.
on 21 Nov 2009 at 1:19 pm 2.Michael said …
You should have entered Q&A, and we might have had a New Yorker on the list.
on 21 Nov 2009 at 4:46 pm 3.Ian Lumsden said …
Thank you for publishing the list, Michael. I know some of the films and will have fun tracking down the others. Difficult decisions though I did feel last year’s winner was the correct one.
on 21 Nov 2009 at 5:13 pm 4.Michael said …
I’m not allowed to give my opinion in print, though there are a couple of corporate films here that I don’t think should be in the running. I’m sorry “VIVE LA ROSE” and “LEONARDO” didn’t make it.
on 21 Nov 2009 at 10:00 pm 5.Theodore Ushev said …
I’m sorry that “Vive la rose” is not on the list too. Haven’t seen Leonardo… though. I’ve seen only 2 or 3 films from the list though. But I must say that I’m agree with Tim Rauch for the Oscars – just another ordinary festival in the world. Sorry about my naivety – but it is something important to be nominated for an Oscar, if You don’t work in a big studio? Does it make You any goods – famous, rich, younger,etc…:)?!
on 22 Nov 2009 at 11:27 am 6.Michael said …
The difference between a Festival is that they’re designed ideally for meeting and greeting while watching animation from your peers. Awards are a side note and get little attention from anyone.
It’s just nice to say you won.
The Oscar is only an Award. It gets you a lot of attention, gets the films a lot of sales, and opens you up to a really big party.
Your comment comparing one to the other,, shows that you haven’t been nominated or won. I’ve been on the short list five times, was nominated once. It’s exciting let me tell you – even being on the short list. Having tasted those sweet grapes, you’d want nothing more than to taste again.
on 22 Nov 2009 at 12:02 pm 7.Theodore Ushev said …
It is very interesting that You say, Michael – having tasted sweet grapes, You’d want nothing more than to taste again.
It sounds like the Oscars nomination are kind of addictive. Like the drugs, or less?:) So there are dangerous, kind of? Does it mean that an animator have to cure himself from “dependency nomination” once he tasted it? And try not to think about it, when he does his next film? I don’t know, I just kind of feel that it shifts the point of view. Being nominated, doesn’t make the film better or worse. This was my only concern, so great films, like “Vive la Rose” who haven’t been lucky to get into, doesn’t have to be disappointed.
But may be You right – certainly it gets more attention to the independent animators, and if it makes them feel well – great!
on 22 Nov 2009 at 12:16 pm 8.Theodore Ushev said …
And also – I’m not arguing – I just ask questions – that I would like to answer even for myself, and have some more opinions, from people closer to this…
on 23 Nov 2009 at 9:04 am 9.Michael said …
Theodore, you don’t have to be an animator to want to be liked. You certainly feel the attention – from everybody – once you’ve been nominated.
Of course, it doesn’t make the film better, and that’s the true reward for making a film – the satisfaction when you’ve accomplished your goals and gotten whatever message you want across to audiences. “Vive la Rose†is an excellent film, and I would have prefered seeing it nominated than others, but my taste rarely dictates the aesthetic of the Oscars. (I’m pleased to have a single vote, though.)
on 13 Jan 2010 at 5:17 pm 10.Jenny said …
This is an old post and I looked it up beause I happened to be at the short list screening last week, but I want to add a thought about something that bugs me a bit(not that I’m arguing with anyone here or anyone in particular-more of a general pet peeve).
Like everyone else who’s grown up watching the Academy Awards ceremonies I have rolled my eyes(and even run from the room)in secondhand embarrassment at the staging and bad writing of the show’s script. I’ve moaned at some winners and some losers not getting their due/getting too much, and I’ve been dismayed at who was left out altogether come nomination time.
That said I really feel the Academy comes in for too much knee-jerk bashing from we film buffs and animation folk. The words “popularity contest” are tossed blithely and smugly around as if there’s a group of 5 high school seniors in someone’s bedroom deciding “winners” based on whims and prejudices only.
Well, of course there is some of that-there would be in any such process. But the Academy at bottom is a 90 year old, hard-to-join private association begun BY film people FOR film people-what a crime, eh?
But I can think of a lot more such organizations(honestly almost all other such)that are way, way more exclusionary towards the public than AMPAS, and do much less for average film-loving joes who may or may not be filmmakers but love films. Of ALL kinds.
There’s their incredible Library for one, where ANYONE can do research and the staff is friendly and helpful. There’s the work they do in film preservation. There’s the incredible, regular and incredibly CHEAP programs of screenings in both Hollywood and Beverly Hills. Speakers that represent not just “famous” performers but animators, writers, FXs and makeup, costimers, all sorts of professionals. All open to me, not a member. Which other guild/club does this on any sort of regular basis?
I’m really bothered that these almost NEVER receive notice or praise, while about once a minute the lameness/clubbiness/commercialization/overall wrongness of the Awards are shouted out as proof of what an obsolete clique the Academy is. Sure, sometimes films win that seem as choices a bit…easy. On the other hand, so have many not-so-mainstream titles.
I guess what I’m saying is: can’t we simply take the honor-including, yes, the very real honor of “just” being nominated-and accept it for what it is rather than pooh-pooh it by denigrating the honor altogether as “meaningless”? As Michael points out, there is a very real value to such recognition–no, it doesn’t “last” forever nor does it even (apparently) guarantee Academy membership, but at least it’s voted on by people working in film-with all their prejudices, yes-but also their expertise and (hopefully) a true understanding of the work, one that is more informed than, say, the various film critics associations usually are…and for pete’s sake–outside of animation and film festivals, who else even gives awards for animation? ASIFA. And there’s yet another kettle of fish.
It’s just so easy to bash AMPAS. Too easy. Okay, rant over.
on 13 Jan 2010 at 5:20 pm 11.Jenny said …
…and I REALLY came here to say how much I loved “French Roast”!
on 13 Jan 2010 at 5:23 pm 12.Michael said …
I couldn’t agree with you more, Jenny. I also like “French Roast” very much.