Movie Review - 2020 Oscar-Nominated Animated Shorts

2020 Oscar-Nominated Animated Shorts **** (out of five) (NR) A nice perk of this job is getting to screen the best of the year’s shorts that one might never otherwise find. The selections are always global in scope, with fascinating little tales or moments presented via an amazing range of visual techniques. The creators of shorts can experiment with cinematic possibilities more readily than those making feature films.

This year’s quintet, supplemented by four other award-worthy shorts to flesh out 104 minutes of running time, features roughly equal proportions of stop-motion, claymation and drawings. The tones are mostly somber in these adult-oriented films. No kiddie cartoons among them, as usual, though there are a few that younger viewers can also enjoy. Many have no dialogue, eliminating the distraction of subtitles for foreign-language entries.

Memorable is a uniquely beautiful depiction of an elderly artist’s progressive dementia. Daughter lyrically covers a family facing the death of a loved one. Sister is a moody recollection of a Chinese boy about his younger sister with a surprising twist. On the lighter side, there’s Hair Love - a father’s struggle with styling his young daughter’s unruly hair for the first time, in preparation for an important event. Finally, Kitbull shows us a rather testy encounter between a feisty stray cat and a curious pet dog that evolves into something else.

Among the other four, The Bird and the Whale is about as elegantly drawn and scored as any in the genre. Hors Piste is the funniest, showing the slapstick efforts of two klutzy emergency workers trying to rescue an injured skier, helpless and alone atop a tall mountain. As always, this program offers excellent films for all tastes. And even if you don’t like one, it’s over soon (none over 16 minutes) to get you to the next.
(1/31/20)