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There was nothing special in the animated shorts this year. The funniest, and my favorite, was "Animal Behavior", but it's a bit risque for general audiences. I'd seen the Pixar short, "Bao", before. It's not one of their best. The memory piece "Late Afternoon" was a slow 9 minutes for a brief payoff at the end. I admit to dozing off during the 15-minute "Weekends." I can see the Academy going with the kid-friendly, girl-power "One Small Step," which has an emotional tug at the end.
Altogether a mostly-uninspiring field, no real winners in all areas of story plus execution plus art plus whatever.
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Pretty simple stories, albeit nicely told, from Bao and Animal Behavior (so far as I've seen), even if the latter could be seen as a treatise signifying toxic masculinity as a mental illness. Although disqualified, I rather liked the Pixar/Sparkshorts release of Kitbull more.
An anonymous director wrote an article for the Hollywood Reporter on what his Oscar votes were and why. Here's what he said on...
Best Animated Short
I personally have a rule that applies to all the shorts categories: I'm not going to vote for anything that is supported in any way by a corporation like Netflix or Amazon or Pixar, because these are supposed to be categories to help little people break through and finally succeed. Even if it's not financed and is just distributed by one of them, they have money to campaign in a way that gives them an unfair advantage. So I will not vote for [Pixar's] Bao because there's just too much fucking money behind it, and the only reason they made it was to win an Academy Award. My problem with this category is Bao is the best of them, and I didn't like any of the other four, so in this category I’m passing.
My Vote: I abstain.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/brutally-honest-oscar-ballot-roma-just-an-expensive-home-movie-1187668/item/best-animated-short-brutally-honest-oscars-ballot-19-1187873
I'm calling it: Uwe Boll said this. Re: the bold portion... he's not wrong. It's why Uncle Walt's hyperbolic chamber was smelted and forged from all of his Oscar trophies.
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Naturally, the winner was BAO. What are you gonna do.
Shrug very violently?
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Naturally, the winner was BAO. What are you gonna do.
Pixar again?
Brother.
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Did anybody else, when watching BAO, get weirded out when the mother put the dumpling in her mouth. And did it twice?
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Did anybody else, when watching BAO, get weirded out when the mother put the dumpling in her mouth. And did it twice?
Left a bad taste.
Clever answer!
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Wow, it is not a strong slate of candidates this year. I was disappointed.
And traditional cel animation has disappeared entirely. And so has humor!
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And I'm going to rag on Pixar, like I do every year:
Doing cute is eye-rolling enough. But cute AND piteous? Oh, that's just lazy.
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This year's animated shorts were distinguished by some unique animation styles. "Memorable" seemed to be claymation; "Sister" was some sort of stuffed-figure-mation. And I don't quite know what "Daughter" was, but I found it the most interesting, technique-wise. "Hair Love" and "Kitbull" were just regular drawn (hand or computer? I can't tell anymore.) animation.
Idea-wise, the motivation behind "Sister" was the most morally conscious, and the film, which seemed to be rather bland in the telling, took on a whole new resonance with the surprise hook at the end. "Daughter" and "Memorable" focused on aspects of personal loss, but the latter at least had a few light moments to liven it up. The two most humorous shorts, "Hair Love" and "Kitbull," almost seem out of place in this company.
If I had to vote, I'd probably go with "Daughter" just because of its look.
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Wow, it is not a strong slate of candidates this year. I was disappointed.
And traditional cel animation has disappeared entirely. And so has humor!
I'm in total agreement with you on all points.
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If I had to vote, I'd probably go with "Daughter" just because of its look.
For its technical achievement of movement and character, I'd go for "Daughter", too.
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The two most humorous shorts, "Hair Love" and "Kitbull," almost seem out of place in this company.
It's grim company if these two were the most humorous!
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And thanks, Bob, for being the person who comments here most faithfully.
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Wow, it is not a strong slate of candidates this year. I was disappointed.
And traditional cel animation has disappeared entirely. And so has humor!
Are cellulose acetates still available for sale on bulk? That would require entire crews, equipment, and overhead to ink and paint and supervise, all of which can be done with the click of a mouse. I miss it too, but practicality usually supersedes aesthetics.
I thought Hair Love was pretty funny, mainly because I can slightly relate.
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