Movie Review - 2016 Oscar-Nominated Shorts

2016 Oscar-Nominated Shorts *** (out of 5) (NR) Remember when “shorts” ran a few minutes? Or no longer than 20? Well, now films in these categories can go as long as 40 minutes, which many do. The 15 contenders - five apiece for Animated, Live-action and Documentary - are split into four programs, with the docs requiring two, for each set to run under 90 minutes. Very few can qualify as humorous, even compared to the Golden Globes’ idea of The Martian being one, making this year’s picks the most serious-to-depressing collection in memory.

The animated offerings include Pixar’s Sanjay’s Super Team as the lightest in tone. Three are foreign, but none of those require reading subtitles, since there’s no dialog. Prologue lives up to its traditional French roots by especially maximizing mood, while minimizing story. The other four provide more food for thought than one generally expects from cartoons. None of these were written for children as its prime demographic.

Among the live-action fare, Ave Maria is rather wryly amusing, as an Orthodox Jewish family finds itself stranded at a convent in the West Bank just at the start of Sabbath, severely limiting their options for getting back home. Three cultures clash in a truly unique and clever manner. Stutterer is a British view of dealing with that impediment via social media. Shok gives us a Serbian war reminiscence. Day One depicts a surprisingly intense start for an Arabic interpreter assigned to an infantry company in hostile territory. Everything Will Be OK is an ironically-titled German post-divorce drama. All are well done, but one must approach them in a serious state of mind to appreciate both style and substance.

...which is why this review does not include coverage of the documentaries. After the rest, I had nothing left in the tank for two-and-a-half more hours of facing some of the darkest aspects of the human condition. This set includes Pakistani “honor killings”, handling large numbers of Ebola corpses, Agent Orange survivors among exposed Vietnamese children, capital punishment up close and personal, and preserving Holocaust histories. I’m sure the treatments of these topics will be first-rate, shining much-needed light on significant issues for viewers who are emotionally ready to deal with what they are about to learn. (1/29/16)