Oscar Nominations 2019: Part 9 of 11

Part 1: Roma, The Favourite, Vice, A Star Is Born.
Part 2: Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Green Book, Bohemian Rhapsody.
Part 3: Mary Poppins Returns, First Man, Cold War.
Part 4: Can You Ever Forgive Me?, If Beale Street Could Talk, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.
Part 5: Never Look Away, Mary Queen of Scots, Isle of Dogs, The Wife.
Part 6: Detainment, Marguerite, Skin, Madre, Fauve.
Part 7: At Eternity's Gate, First Reformed, Shoplifters, Capernaum.
Part 8: Spider man: into the Spider-verse, Incredibles 2, Mirai, Ralph Breaks the Internet.
Part 9:

Bao

1 Nomination

• Animated Short Film

Director: Domee Shi

This is very cute and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny. I really love the strange – even slightly creepy – comparison of children to dumplings. I really enjoyed this in its entirety. It's sort of the perfect thematic pairing to Incredibles 2, with which it screened in cinemas, but its also smarter than that film in many ways, and I think smart in general about parenthood and its discontents. I was really into this. Also it made me want dim sum. Actually, I always want dim sum.
Will Win: Animated Short Film
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #3 of 5

Animal Behaviour

1 Nomination

• Animated Short Film

Director: David Fine, Alison Snowden

Cast: Ryan Beil, Taz Van Rassell, Leah Juel, Andrea Libman, Toby Berner, James Kirk, Snowden

Ugh. This one had a few good jokes, but this has nothing new to say about animals, about group therapy, or anything else. It's just a set of inane jokes (half of them about assholes (seriously) or overeating, for some reason). Also, the animation is not very attractive. If I laughed occasionally through this, I also just felt icky afterward. I dunno... people's psychological problems just kind of aren't that funny to me at the moment. This is silly, and I should probably just have let myself go and enjoyed it, but this really isn't my kind of humor.
Will Win: N/A
Could Win: Animated Short Film
My Rating: #4 of 5

One Small Step

1 Nomination

• Animated Short Film

Director: Andrew Chesworth, Bobby Pontillas

Ok. This one is the most boring of the five, but it's also probably the most heartwarming of the five, as well. This is about a girl and her father. He repairs her shoes (one small step) and she wants to go to the moon (one small step, indeed). Her name is Luna, so I really feel like it was probably this young woman's destiny to go to the moon; don't know why she ever doubted herself. In any case, One Small Step is the kind of do-it-for-dad sweet little bit of emotional fluff that feels totally predictable at this point in history. You will see every single plot point coming a mile away.
Will Win: N/A
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #5 of 5

Late Afternoon

1 Nomination

• Animated Short Film

Director: Louise Bagnall

Cast: Fionnula Flanagan, Bagnall, Niamh Moyles, Aislin Konings Ferrari

So, so good. This movie is absolutely lovely. It's beautifully animated and beautifully acted. The animation is honestly just gorgeous. I loved it. This is a story of a woman with Alzheimer's as she tries to remember some events in her past. This inability/ability to remember is animated with beautiful large colored blobs as our main character soars amid the colors and snatches of memory come to her as she floats. It's a beautiful little film.
Will Win: N/A
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #2 of 5

Weekends

1 Nomination

• Animated Short Film

Director: Trevor Jimenez

This was my favorite of the five. It's a deeply personal film – or at least feels deeply personal. A boy goes back and forth between his father and his mother, and we see his experiences in both locations. The film is about space and how spaces become homes, but it's also about growing up with parents who don't quite pay attention to you as much as you'd like them to, and it's about figuring out how to carve space for yourself within their self-absorbed worlds. Weekends is a lonely, occasionally very sad film that is run through with a lovely, innocent, and wonderful sense of humor. It is purely Chekhovian in the way that it couples laughter and sadness together. The animation is done in gorgeous watercolors, and every single piece of this feels beautifully considered and carefully constructed. I absolutely loved it.
Will Win: N/A
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #1 of 5