Oscar-Nominated Animated Short Films-2017

Directors Glen Keane, Florian Babikian, Dave Mullins, Ru Kuwahata, Jan Lachauer

Scott’s Review #727

Reviewed February 21, 2018

Grade: A-

It was amazing to have the honor of viewing the five short films nominated for the 2017 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film at my local art theater.

Far too often dismissed as irrelevant or completely flying under the radar of animated offerings, it is time to champion these fine little pieces of artistic achievement.

Each of the five offers a vastly different experience, on par with or even superseding the full-length animated features. Still, each offers inspired or hopeful messages or dark, devious, and edgy stories.

Below is a review of each Short.

Garden Party-2016

Perhaps the strangest of all the shorts,  the viewer is transported into an eerie world of amphibians.

It seems like a pair, but it is unclear if this is so. They seem to expand or multiply as they follow their primal instincts, navigating a wealthy mansion.

Containing spilled champagne, a revolver, various items, and evidence of a party, the amphibians jump around and communicate from room to room.

When eventually they descend on a dead and bloated fat man in a vast swimming pool, the film ends mysteriously.

The short was impressively a French animation school’s graduation project. Grade: A-

Lou-2017

An impressive Pixar product, Lou is the more accessible of all the entries with a heartfelt and uplifting message.

In this age of school bullying awareness, the piece is essential. Chubby J.J. enjoys snatching other kids’ toys on the playground, keeping them for himself.

A sweet creature named Lou collects lost toys and shapes himself using the toys, returning them to various parts of the playground for the kids to find the next day. When Lou and J.J.’s worlds collide, Lou teaches J.J. a valuable lesson in goodness and fairness.

Lou is an excellent short film that must be seen by small children and adults alike to experience a humanistic, wonderful tale. Grade: A

Dear Basketball-2017 (won)

The shortest of all the entries, Dear Basketball, is a piece written by NBA superstar Kobe Bryant. It features a lovely narrative by a young boy (presumably Bryant himself) who develops a love for the game of basketball and his inevitable rise among the ranks of athletes.

As he ages, his body wears down, and he realizes his time on the court has ended.

The storytelling in Dear Basketball inspires young boys and girls everywhere. Although it is a piece about basketball, it can be an inspired message about anything.

My one slight gripe to this Short is its minimal length and I wonder if it could have been fleshed out slightly. Grade: B+

Revolting Rhymes-2016

By far my favorite of the bunch and also by far the longest in length, Revolting Rhymes is based on the book of the same name by legendary author Roald Dahl.

It is a dark and disturbing collection of intertwined fairy tales.

As a wolf engages an older woman in a coffee shop and regales her with stories of his two nephews, he incorporates the stories of Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White, and the Three Little Pigs into his storytelling until the wolf does something dire to the woman.

The short is only part one of a two-part collection as part one concludes with a cliffhanger assuring the viewer will see the next chapter.

With a crisp written story and intelligent premise, Revolting Rhymes is the most unique and deserving of the Oscar statuette since its complexities make it the most cerebral. Grade: A

Negative Space-2017

Negative Space, another wonderful French nugget, is an exemplary stop-motion story about an odd relationship between a father and son.

The pair’s psychological elements are not too heavily dissected, but with a longer piece, they could have some bonding issues. The father works as a frequently traveling businessman, and father and son strangely bond solely over packing a suitcase and the efforts to never leave an inch of suitcase space underutilized.

As the father eventually dies and lies in a coffin, the son is bothered by the leftover space the coffin leaves.

A macabre and humorous Short, I was left wanting more backstory of said father and son, but what a clever tale Negative Space is. Grade: A