In Contention

Tag: Best Documentary Short

  • On the Academy’s other rule changes

    With the big news out of the way, there are a few other annual house-cleaning rule alterations that ought to be addressed.

    First up, the Best Animated Feature Film category — which seems to get a face-lift in the rule book every summer — will now have anywhere from three to five nominees. As it was, in a year with 16 qualifying titles, five nominees would be selected. Less than the magic number 16 would yield just three nominees. Now, if 13 to 15 films qualify, four of them will be nominated by the branch. Under that, I’m assuming it’s just three as always.

    VERDICT: I’m okay with this, I suppose, but the qualifying numbers still feel quite arbitrary. Still, this keep quality-heavy films that happen to be quantity-thin for animated output from being slighted.

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  • OSCAR GUIDE: Best Documentary (Short Subject)

    This is the first year the documentary shorts will be a part of Magnolia Pictures and Shorts International’s annual program.  They will open with the live action and animated contenders in New York on February 11 and in Los Angeles on February 18.  Bravo for including them.

    It’s also a great slate of films.  As we know, 2010 was a very strong year for documentary feature filmmaking.  But that quality seems to have extended well into the short subject side of things if this year’s nominees in the category are any indication.  Each entry is powerful in its own way, a wide array of issues and personas skillfully tackled across the board.

    The nominees are:

    “Killing in the Name” (Jed Rothstein)
    “Poster Girl” (Sara Nesson and Mitchell W. Block)
    “Strangers No More” (Karen Goodman and Kirk Simon)
    “Sun Come Up” (Jennifer Redfearn and Tim Metzger)
    “The Warriors of Qiugang” (Ruby Young and Thomas Lennon)

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  • 10/15 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: An unpolished ‘Hereafter,’ women dominate doc shorts, CGI in story-driven contenders

    • Melissa Silverstein on female dominance in the documentary shorts field. [Women and Hollywood]

    • Turns out Clint Eastwood filmed an early, unpolished draft of Peter Morgan’s “Hereafter.”  Well…it shows. [Vulture]

    • Speaking of which, David Cohen spotlights the impact of digital wizardry on that story-driven film as well as Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan.” [Variety]

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  • AMPAS, Cinema Eye Honors narrow doc short fields

    The Academy has just announced the eight finalists for this year’s Best Documentary Short award.  They are:

    “Born Sweet”
    “Killing in the Name”
    “Living for 32”
    “One Thousand Pictures: RFK’s Last Journey”
    “Poster Girl”
    “Strangers No More”
    “Sun Come Up”
    “The Warriors of Qiugang”

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  • ‘Rabbit à la Berlin’ trailer

    You might recall Kris and Anne disagreeing in last week’s Oscar Talk over the relative merits of this oddball nominee in the Best Documentary Short race. If you were wondering what they were on about, here’s an idea. (Thanks to The Auteurs for the tip.)

  • OSCAR TALK: Ep. 23 — Divebombing the competition, doc and live action shorts, foreign film, etc.

    Oscar TalkWelcome to Oscar Talk, a weekly kudocast between yours truly and Anne Thompson of Thompson on Hollywood.

    Every week inches us closer to the end of the loudest Oscar season of all time. Today Anne and I sit down and discuss the noise of the week, adding our own noise (we went on a bit long this week):

    • Leading off, Anne has a whole new reason to hate “the 10”: members just aren’t bothering with ranking and the preferential ballot, not to mention the rigging and manipulation that goes into making it an impure process.

    • Things are getting “hairy,” as Anne puts it, with a close race bringing out the worst in people. We talk about “The Hurt Locker” and EmailGate and add some much-needed perspective on the matter.

    • We bounce around ideas for dark horse contenders that could benefit from the preferential ballot (assuming it’s taken seriously).

    • We also discuss the documentary shorts at length (now that I’ve seen them all) as well as the live action short films (now that Anne has seen them all).

    • Finally, we discuss a potential upset lurking in documentary feature nominee “Which Way Home” as well as “A Prophet” in the scheme of the Best Documentary Feature race.

    Have a listen below, with a track from James Horner’s “Avatar” score leading the way. And as always, you can subscribe to Oscar Talk via iTunes here.

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  • OSCAR GUIDE: Best Documentary Short

    Prudence Mabhena in Music by PrudenceMuch like the live action and animated short fields, in order for voters to cast their ballots for the documentary short category, they have to attend screenings of all the nominees. This tends to make these categories a bit tougher to predict, because they are frequently immune to noise in the media. You screen, you vote.

    However, if you’re aware of what the committee likes, you can eventually find the pulse. In all these fields, these committees tend to appreciate doing a lot within the time frame constrictions of a short film, which is why animated shorts that resonate, live action shorts with high production value and documentary shorts that succinctly tackle a subject always come out on top.

    The nominees are:

    “China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province” (Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neil)
    “The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardener” (Daniel Junge and Henry Ansbacher)
    “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant” (Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert)
    “Music by Prudence” (Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett)
    “Rabbit à la Berlin” (Bartek Konopka and Anna Wydra)

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  • OSCAR TALK: Ep. 22 — “All the noise, noise, noise, noise!”

    Oscar TalkWelcome to Oscar Talk, a weekly kudocast between yours truly and Anne Thompson of Thompson on Hollywood.

    Every week inches us closer to the end of the loudest Oscar season of all time. Today Anne and I sit down and discuss the noise of the week, adding our own noise (we went on a bit long this week):

    • Anne was in attendance at Monday’s nominees luncheon so she offers some first-person perspective on the goings-on.

    • Speaking on the clutter, the glut of festive gatherings and contender pitching has hit a fever pitch, so we wax on about that a bit.

    • Harvey Weinstein got his druthers this week as any and everyone desperate for something to write about has picked up on his proclamation that “Inglourious Basterds” will win Best Picture.

    • The original song performances were nixed from the telecast this week, which leads us into a discussion of trepidation over how things will play out on March 7.

    • Finally, we talk through a number of the below-the-line races before addressing the foreign language and documentary short categories at some length.

    Have a listen below, with Jeff Bridges leading the way with a little ditty. And as always, you can subscribe to Oscar Talk via iTunes here.

    [display_podcast]

    Subscribe to Oscar Talk

  • ‘China’s Unnatural Disaster’ the real David of the Oscar race?

    This press release just landed in the inbox, so I thought I’d pass it along free of commentary:

    DAVID AND GOLIATH AT THE 2010 OSCAR AWARDS
    “China’s Unnatural Disaster” faces governmental opposition

    New York, NY- China’s Unnatural Disaster: the Tears of Sichuan Province, the latest documentary by Jon Alpert and Matt O’Neill, has been facing fierce opposition by the Chinese government as it makes its run for the Oscars this year. Since production began in 2008, China has fought the film at every opportunity and shows no signs of slowing as the Academy Awards draw near.

    China’s Unnatural Disaster is an investigation into the 2008 Sichuan earthquake that destroyed many poorly-constructed schools, killing an estimated 10,000 children. The film follows the bereaved parents as they seek answers from the government and are ignored and intimidated. The Chinese Government implemented a well-coordinated campaign to censor and suppress any inquiry into the tragedy. In addition to jailing and threatening local filmmakers and journalists, the government attempted to stop Alpert and O’Neill.

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  • Sendak doc makes for a beautiful portrait of an artist

    Maurice SendakI sat down this morning to watch Lance Bangs and Spike Jonze’s “Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak,” which originally aired on HBO last night, expecting little more than a swift, arbitrary look at the author and perhaps a nice companion piece to Jonze’s adaptation of “Where the Wild Things Are.” Boy was I in for a surprise.

    The film (which is on Oscar’s short list for documentary shorts) is instantly one of the 2009’s great joys, a compelling, insightful study from the perspective of the genuine article.  And Sendak is indeed the genuine article, a directly honest man who has transformed his take on the world into profound art for most of his 81 years.  And at that healthy old age, he seems equally awed by, and bored with, the realities of the world.

    Filming began in 2003 at Sendak’s home in Connecticut.  The seasons zip back and forth, spring sunshine to winter snowdrift, as Bangs and Jonze piece together the meat of Jonze’s conversations with the author.  The title stems from Sendak’s opinion that there should be no demarcation when it comes to age.  “I don’t believe in childhood,” he says.  “Like, ‘You mustn’t tell them that,’ ‘You mustn’t tell them that.’  You tell them anything you want…If it’s true, you tell them.”

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  • 10/14 Oscarweb Round-up

    The Hangover• Dave Karger, in a slow news week, digs up the old “‘Hangover’ for Best Pic” notion.  No. [Oscar Watch]

    • Jeff Wells face-to-face with “Fantastic Mr. Fox” director Wes Anderson. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

    • Susan King talks to editing legend Anne V. Coates, whose career was showcased at the Academy last night. [Los Angeles Times]

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  • Short list for short docs revealed

    From AMPAS.  The nominees will be decided from this crop (films linked to respective IMDb pages or pertinent sites):

    “China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province”
    Downtown Community Television Center, Inc.

    “The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner”
    Just Media

    “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”
    Community Media Prods.

    “Lt. Watada”
    Chanlim Films

    “Music by Prudence”
    iThemba Prods.

    “Rabbit a la Berlin”
    MS Films

    “Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak”
    Outside Prods.

    “Woman Rebel”
    Women Rebel Films

  • 28 docs boost their Oscar profile at DocuWeeks

    Racing DreamsFor documentaries, qualifying for Oscar consideration can be a rough ride. Academy rules stipulate that a film must at least enjoy a week-long theatrical run, in both New York and Los Angeles, to be eligible — which can be a tall order for tiny movies on tricky subjects.

    So — acting as a kind of fairy godmother to independent documentary makers struggling for exposure — we have DocuWeeks, a three-week-long showcase sponsored by the International Documentary Association, in which a selection of features and shorts screen on both coasts. In doing so, they both qualify for the Academy awards and raise their profile to potential voters.

    It’s a nifty tradition that has already seen 16 films go on to make the Oscar ballot, including 2007’s winning feature  “Taxi to the Dark Side” and last year’s champ in the short race, “Smile Pinki.”

    This year sees a total of 28 films — 18 features and 10 shorts — in the DocuWeeks lineup, so it seems safe to wager that we’ll be hearing more about at least some of them as the awards season progresses. I admit I don’t keep up the documentary side of things as much as I should, so I know next to nothing about most of the inclusions in the globally diverse group.

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  • Programming note: ‘Smile Pinki’ set to premiere on HBO

    You might recall my woefully off-base assumption that the sublime “The Conscience of Nhem En” was all set to win the Oscar last year for Best Documentary Short.  Well, I was wrong, but at least I wasn’t wrong with a crowd (most people were predicting “The Witness from the Balcony of Room 306”).

    Anyway, we all probably should have seen the eventual winner coming, given all the press and hoopla surrounding “Smile Pinki” on the way to last February’s Oscarcast.  If you never had a chance to see the film, now’s your chance.  “Smile Pinki” will premiere Wednesday, June 3 on HBO at 7:00pm EST.  Have a few tissues handy.  Here’s a great shot of the film’s subject, Pinki Sonkar, with filmmaker Megan Mylan at the Oscars this year:

    (from left) Pinki Sonkar and Megan Mylan at the 81st annual Academy Awards

  • Congrats to our pool winners!

    First, thanks to all involved for participating in our Oscar pool.  The big winners were Mikey Filmmaker and Justin Wolfhope who nailed 22 of 24 categories for a score of 88 points (out of 100).  I weighted the scoring system based on the predictability of the categories.  Mikey and Justin both missed the same two categories: Best Sound Mixing and Best Documentary Short.  They went for “The Dark Knight” on the former and “The Conscience of Nhem En” on the latter.

    Yours truly came in second with 21 of 24 categories for a score of 83.  I went with my heart on Mickey Rourke and my heart failed me.  Let that be a lesson to us all.

    Mikey and Justin, if you’re reading, send me an email when you can.  I think I’ll offer up a prize for such fantastic Oscar prognosticating prowess.

  • WEEKLY WRAP: BAFTAs, Berlin, pre-Oscar jitters

    Aside from two major precursors, it’s been a slow week for news — which leads to a lot of prediction second-guessing.

    • “Slumdog” swept at the BAFTAs, which also put new wind in Mickey Rourke’s sails. We live-blogged it here.

    • The “Slumdog” streak inevitably continued at the WGA Awards, where “Milk” picked up some hardware too.

    • This week’s Off the Carpet column was just eager to move on already.

    • Taking a closer look at the often inscrutable Best Documentary Short race.

    • Speaking of documentaries, we wondered if a win for “Man on Wire” is the foregone conclusion that people think it is.

    • On a similar tack, do we have a real race in the Best Foreign Language Film category?

    • In a bit of a blow to next week’s Oscarcast, Peter Gabriel has nixed his participation.

    • A survey of some of the industry’s top DPs suggests that “Slumdog” looks like the one to beat for Best Cinematography too.

    • Should we be mindful of a third possibility in the Best Actor race?

    • Perhaps another underdog, “Frozen River,” has hidden strengths in the competition.

    • Away from the Oscar beat, the Berlinale continued its quiet progress, with Stephen Frears’ “Chéri” possibly one to watch.

  • Digging into the Oscar nominated documentary shorts

    The Conscience of Nhem EnLast week I pored through the animated and live action short films that find themselves in Oscar contention this year in order to help give a leg up in your Oscar pools.  Over the weekend, I decided to take a good, long look at the nominated documentary shorts, which rarely find any coverage this time of year.  I can’t be the only that gets tired of taking blind stabs at who’ll win in this category, so here’s what I turned up…

    There are four nominees in the category, as usual.  And two of the films are strikingly similar in tone and subject matter, doubly so in the face of the year’s likely Oscar sweeper, “Slumdog Millionaire.”

    Megan Mylan’s “Smile Pinki” covers pro bono palate lip surgery in rural India, but it isn’t that dissimilar from any number of 60-minute infomercials you’ve come across on television.  Also, Oscar.com’s brief synopsis of the film suggests more drama than actually exists.  It could win for being a heart-warming affair because it really is the story of newfound hope in the social lives of young children, but I found it a bit derivative.

    Irene Taylor Brodskey’s “The Final Inch,” however, is a much more intriguing look at the country, following the work of volunteers mobilizing efforts (the largest non-military army in history) to eradicate polio in the slums of India.  From a cultural standpoint, it is at times quite fascinating.  Some families refuse the “medical wisdom” of the West in favor of faith in their God, leaving a very simple vaccination process ignored and many young children crippled at an early age for no good reason.

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  • Title confusion — ‘The Witness’

    I’m looking over the Oscar nominated short documentaries and when I put in what I thought was going to be “The Witness — From the Balcony of Room 306,” I was greeted with the title screen “The Witness: The Last Days of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.”

    So…uh…what gives?  Anyone privy?