Animated Oscar-Nominated Shorts (2020)
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Opera
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A Short Stack
By Jeffrey M. Anderson
April 9, 2021—This year's nominees are a cut above,
featuring an adorable new Pixar cartoon, as well as two others that are
astonishing visual starbursts. Pixar's Burrow tells the story of a cute
bunny looking to dig himself a nice, quiet home, but keeps accidentally
popping out into other animals' burrows. Adrien Merigeau's Genius Loci,
from France is one of my favorites, a phantasmagorical odyssey into a
night filled with changing shapes and morphing colors; yet it has a
human focus, and you can feel its pain and wonder. My favorite is Erick
Oh's Opera, a co-production of South Korea and the USA. It's difficult
to describe, but it unfolds in one shot, as it tilts down the length of
a triangle-shaped civilization. Hundreds of miniature figures go about
their day-to-day business, all around the frame. As the camera arrives
at the bottom and starts back up again, the civilization's
epic-in-miniature story starts to become clear. It's the kind of film
you'll want to see many times, as there's something tiny going on in
every sector of the frame at every given moment, and it's truly
incredible. Gísli Darri Halldórsson and Arnar Gunnarsson's Yes-People,
from Iceland, is a one-joke short, mildly amusing. The one I liked
least, Will McCormack and Michael Govier's If Anything Happens I Love
You is a rather shameless piece about a young girl who has died in a
school shooting, and it's — of course — the front-runner to win at this
point. See this program for the others. For info on where to stream the shorts, or see
them in theaters, see here.
