In anticipation of the Academy Awards, I generally try to catch the Oscar-nominated shorts, which usually come in the form of four films. Live Action, Animated and Documentary parts A and B. These film compilations include the nominees, and sometimes Honorable Mentions as well. This generally helps draw the length of the program out to feature length time. IN years past, previous winners have narrated and introduced the films. For 2019, they have dropped the introductions. The films also had a run time listed on the film title page, which is missing this year. The first film my wife and I have screened contained the five live action short nominations. It is a very dark year for the live action films. Following are the nominees:
Madre takes place in an apartment in Spain. This nineteen-minute short focuses on banter between a woman (Marta Nieto) and her mother. A phone call from her son indicates that the six-year-old is stranded on a beach with no one else nearby. His father was supposed to be retrieving toys from their car and never returned. The film turns frantic as the mother attempts to coordinate a response as the boy's situation turns dark. The performances were excellent. The story was tense and interesting. It ended a bit abruptly. 7.5/10.
Fauve opens with two boys playing in and around an abandoned train. It is typical boy horseplay. The boys are constantly trying to best each other, but it is playful fun. Their hijinx move from the abandoned train through a field and end up in a semi-abandoned quarry. As the boys play in the low area of the quarry where runoff has settled, things turn decidedly dark. Their horseplay has dire consequences leading to an unsettling ending. This film was interesting, particularly in the way the story tied together at the end. It was dark and sad. I liked the kids, but was a little bit frustrated. A strong entry. Seventeen minutes. 8/10.
Margauerite is a tender examination of home health care. An elderly woman (Beatrice Picard) is rejecting dialysis and knows she is near the end of her life. She waxes nostalgic about her own younger years and relationships. She finds a kind and caring empathy in her home health care nurse (Sandrine Bisson) who goes above and beyond to bring her elderly charge a sense of peace. I thought this film was okay, but a bit too pretentious for me. It was the only film that was not dark, which was nice. Because these selections ran way to negative this year. I liked the performances, but didn't really feel engaged. Nineteen minutes. 7/10.
Detainment is a disturbing examination of the 1993 murder of James Bulger by two ten-year-old boys. The film is told through a combination of re-enactments of the abduction cut against the simultaneous interrogations of the two boys. The film slowly unravels the events as it tracks the actual interrogations using archived audio from the interviews and subsequent trial. The story becomes increasingly brutal as we witness two seemingly mischievous boys revealed for the monsters they are. The acting in this film was phenomenal. The casting not only managed to capture the look of the boys, but also featured exceptional acting. But it was brooding and dark. The darkest of the dark films this year. Thirty minutes. 8/10.
I liked Skin least of this years nominations. It was dark, far-fetched and not worth the irony. The film begins by focusing on a white supremacist and his young son. The film gives them a very small degree of humanity before becoming sidetracked with caricatures in the place of characters. The cartoon quality of the characters made the irony irrelevant. I didn't care about the characters. The irony was easy to predict as well. It was typical agenda-driven political diatribe posing as art. It lacked credibility from top to bottom. This includes both perspectives in the story. An attempt to draw a correlation fell flat because the characters were so tritely handled. Twenty minutes. 6.5/10.
Fauve - I liked the way this film was constructed. It was innocent but dark. It was credible. It was hard to watch, yet felt complete. It felt like a tragedy one would read about in the paper.
Skin - Hollywood can help themselves. It doesn't matter that Skin is derivative. It won't matter that the characters are completely incredible. This is a piece of social justice art. Hollywood eats this stuff up.
Marguerite is my darkhorse, although Detainment was my second favorite of the five. I think Detainment may just be too overwhelming to the senses. Marguerite is tender, it has decent characters and it has a social justice element. As I have already mentioned, Hollywood loves social justice. Even at the expense of the art form. I like good cinema. If Marguerite were to win out over Skin, at least the better film will have prevailed. Just not the best.
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