Category Archives: Academy Awards

Academy Awards Preview – Live Action Shorts

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Oscar, Academy AwardsGetting ready for Oscar, the Trenton Film Society continued its “shorts weekend” yesterday with the live action shorts (see 3-1-14 post for the documentary shorts). Again, there were five nominees—all  foreign.  Between films were excerpts of interviews with a number of directors, including Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave) and Sean and Andrea Nix Fine who grabbed the documentary Oscar last year for Inocente and Shawn Christensen who won the live action prize with Curfew—both of them extraordinary.

In these interviews, a number of producer/directors talked about the constraints of the short film, which are parallel to the challenges of the short story. The author/creator must be economical, focused, and, if the creative process is working well, can say something more piercingly memorable than in a novel or full-length film. They also spoke about how early short films presage the themes and approaches of full-length features later in the creator’s career.

Possibly, the beauty of short films will become more recognized as people become accustomed to consuming media in shorter and shorter formats. (Thank you, YouTube!)

The live action nominees were:

  • Helium (Denmark) – a sweet film, in which a new hospital worker befriends a dying child and helps him prepare for death by envisioning the imaginary land of “Helium”
  • Avant Que de Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything)(France) – A woman and her children flee her abusive husband—tremendous tension, nicely paced
  • Pitaako Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? (Do I have to Take Care of Everything?)(Finland)—Hilarious doings as a couple and their two young daughters get themselves ready for a wedding—the shortest, at 13 minutes
  • The Voorman Problem (U.K.)—starring Martin Freeman (Dr. John Watson in Sherlock) as a prison psychiatric consultant who confronts an inmate prisoner who believes he is a god, possibly God. Based on a bit of David Mitchell’s interesting novel No. 9 Dream (though I didn’t remember this bit)
  • Aquel No Era Yo (That Wasn’t Me)(Spain)—Spanish aid workers encounter xxx child soldiers, and it isn’t pretty.

Watch them online or through Netflix and know what Ellen DeGeneris is talking about tonight!

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Hot Ticket

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Ra Paulette, Academy Award, documentary, Cave DiggerImpossible to view and practically ignored a few years ago, the Oscar-nominated short films have become one of the hottest tickets around. Last night I saw the documentary shorts and later today will see the live action shorts. These viewings are courtesy of the Trenton Film Society, which shows the films at the intimate Mill Hill Playhouse in Trenton. (The festival also offers the nominees in the animation category.)

In recent years the short films have become available through Netflix and other resources, but I like the Big Screen—well, the Bigger Screen—at the Playhouse.

Only one overworked word describes the five documentary shorts: Awesome.

  • A 109-year-old Holocaust survivor, Alice Herz-Sommer (obituary, 2/27/14), who played the piano in Theresienstadt and was still playing at the time of filming, who says, “I love people” (The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life).
  • A gay man, nearly beaten to death as a teenager, becomes acquainted with the former skinhead who was one of his attackers (Facing Fear)
  • The Yemeni protests that turned violent and led to the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, seen through the eyes of youthful cameramen (Karama Has No Walls)
  • Unlikely artist, Ra Paulette, working alone and by hand carves magical caves out of soft New Mexico sandstone (Cave Digger)
  • The last days and death of convicted murderer Jack Hall in the loving care of inmate volunteers in an Iowa prison hospice (Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall)

Real people doing amazing things. Truly awesome.

A Painful Memorial

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Philip Seymour Hoffman, playwright, American Playwriting FoundationYesterday’s New York Times included a front page story and full-page announcement of the establishment of “The American Playwriting Foundation,” to make annual $45,000 grants for creators of new American plays, one of the largest awards available for this purpose today. The Foundation was established in honor of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, “who relentlessly sought out truth in his work and demanded the same from his collaborators.”

Initial funding for the Foundation came from the National Enquirer, which published an interview with someone falsely claiming to be Hoffman’s friend David Bar Katz. In its haste to print this information, the newspaper “made a good faith error” by inadequately checking its source. Katz’s subsequent lawsuit led to an apology, and “instead of seeking a purely personal reward for the harm done to him, Mr. Katz brought the lawsuit as a vehicle to . . .create something positive out of this unfortunate turn of events.”

Out of one man’s tragedy, another’s unselfishness, and the foolishness of an entity with more money than sense, miraculously, something good may rise.

My 7/28/14 review of Hoffman’s last major role, in what is both movie title and obituary, “A Most Wanted Man.”

 

Nebraska

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Bad work karma has kept me away from this website, and I miss reaching out to my invisible friends.Just had to write to tell you, urge you, implore you to see Alexander Payne’s movie Nebraska (trailer here), with Bruce Dern and Will Forte. Dern is the aging dad who thinks he’s won a million dollars in a bogus sweepstakes and won’t be talked out of it.

The script spot-on captures the relations between parents and children and old married couples. Heartwarming, without being sappy. Moments of hilarity when we recognize ourselves. Reviewers who say Payne doesn’t like Nebraskans (he is one, after all) miss the whole point. People like the characters in the movie can be found everywhere, which is what gives the film its appeal.

Excellent performances from the large cast of the old man’s relatives and long-ago friends whose “congratulations!” come with a predatory gleam in the eye. (Rated 91 on the Tomatometer.)

Christopher Wallenberg interviewed Dern for the Boston Globe, and the actor—a top contender for an Academy Award Best Actor nomination and Best Actor winner at Cannes—says what he tried to do was find “real moments.” And find them he did. You can never be sure how much his character really hears or knows. More than he lets on, you may suspect. His son has the insight to look past the apocryphal sweepstakes win to see that what his father really wants is “something to live for.”

Forte plays a supporting role in both the film and the story, attuned to the possibilities of an impossible quest. Familiar to Saturday Night Live audiences, Forte nails this difficult role, making not only his character feel real, but also, by the self-effacing negative space he creates, enabling his cranky dad to become a fully realized, sympathetic person, too.  

Interesting that the film is shot in black and white, in Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nebraska. The scenes of that lovely country—plus one long shot of Mt. Rushmore—“OK, we’ve seen it, let’s go,” says the cantankerous old coot—lose nothing in the cinematographer’s soft greys and charcoals. I once worked with a brilliant photographer who only shot in black and white. When I asked why, she said, “My black and white looks like color.” So does Nebraska’s! See these inspired photos.

Telling an Award-Winning Story

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Live-action shorts are to feature films as short stories are to novels. You have to get in fast, establish the scene and your characters, make a limited number of points—and out you go. I wrote about the short documentaries nominated for the Oscar last week. Now that we know Curfew won the live-action category—it got my vote!—here’s why.

The other four nominees (and all the documentaries) were pretty depressing. True, Curfew opens with a young man (filmmaker Shawn Christensen) sitting in a bathtub full of bloodied water, and he’s holding a razor blade. Damage has been done. Still somehow there’s a sense of incipient redemption, because when his sister phones in desperation (“you’re last on my list”) and asks him to babysit her nine-year-old daughter for a few hours, you know he’ll say “OK.” After he cleans himself up.

The unlikely relationship between the uncle and niece develops engagingly. A true story is unfolding there. Curfew benefited from the charming, cool, and always on-point performance by Fátima Ptacek (with Christensen at left).

 

Two other films were about children–young boys living in impoverished circumstances (Afghanistan and Somalia) whose big dreams are hard to hold onto. In Oscar handicapping, these two cancelled each other out. Today’s U.S. child actors are vastly better trained and directed than they used to be. These boys hadn’t had that support and retained some awkwardness.

The fourth movie was about an aging gentleman, a concert pianist, facing a confusing mélange of past and present, real and unreal, as he searches for his wife. Well done, if a little too predictable and a lot too like Amour, so a no-go for this year in such a strong field, the critics agree. And the last, Death of a Shadow (right), too slow-moving and surreal, short on action and long on atmosphere and outright weirdness. Steampunk clocks, silhouettes of corpses, endless corridors, creepy teeth.

While all the short documentaries were right around 40 minutes, making for a squirmy evening in only semi-comfortable chairs, all but one of the live action shorts were half that length. Curfew packed in so much feeling and character that it was a rich experience, deep if not long. And, BTW, it was edited on Christensen’s MacBook Pro!

  • Curfew (USA, 19 minutes) trailer
  • Asad (South Africa, 18 minutes) trailer
  • Buzkashi Boys (Afghanistan, 28 minutes) trailer
  • Death of a Shadow (Belgium/France, 20 minutes) trailer
  • Henry (Canada, 21 minutes) trailer

Oscar’s Documentary Faves

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A real treat this weekend, viewing all the Oscar-nominated short films in the documentary and live action categories! The treat part was seeing such remarkable filmmaking, though the subject matter of the documentaries, described here, was, well, let’s just say, “tears were shed.”

♦ King’s Point will be grimly familiar to those who know South Florida’s senior communities. The residents’ acerbic observations drew knowing laughs, but the jury remains out as to whether this type of congregate living is really a good thing or a concession to society’s lack of better choices for the elderly.

♦ Most moving for me was Mondays at Racine, about two sisters who once a month provide free services in their hair salon for women with cancer. Having their heads shaved exquisitely focuses and concentrates the women’s sense of loss and despair; the powerful emotional counterweight is the support of the sisters and their “been there” clients.

♦ Have you noticed the growing number of NYC homeless collecting bottles and cans by the hundreds (5¢ each)? Redemption exposes the way of life—and the diversity—of Americans whose survival now depends on others’ trash.

♦ Open Heart is the story of eight Rwandan children who must leave their families to travel 2,500 miles for surgery at Africa’s only hospital providing high-risk cardiac care for free. Meanwhile, the Italian medical organization running the hospital must fight the Sudanese president for promised financial support.

♦ Last, and probably the cinematically strongest of the lot, with a nice story arc, is Inocente, a talented San Diego teen (pictured above) who dreams of becoming an artist—a goal made even harder to achieve because she also is undocumented and homeless. All five films introduce viewers to some remarkable people, well worth knowing.

2-25 Update: And, yes, Inocente won, and it was great to see Inocente herself on stage with the winning team, as they called for more support for the arts and young artists.