Best Animated Short Film of 2014

The Bigger Picture, a short from the United Kingdom, is a very downbeat film. It concerns two middle-aged brothers and their ailing mother who needs to be committed to a nursing home. One of the brothers, Richard, does all of the work caring for her, but he remains perpetually underappreciated. The other, Nick, is a bit of a snob, to be honest, and quite unappealing, but he always takes credit for anything good that he does, no matter how small. The film gives a clear sense of the different personalities of the two brothers, one of whom is unemployed and a bit of a loser and the other being the one for whom everything seems to come easily. The short features a couple of moments of levity here and there, but I suppose a filmmaker would find it tough to make this material funny. At times, the short’s images look almost like paintings, crudely drawn perhaps, but they must have been large to match the actual sized furnishings on display. The attempt at reconciliation seems forced here despite knowing that this scenario is too common among siblings.

The Dam Keeper tackles the subject of how important friendship can be to someone being bullied. A little pig lives alone in a windmill that keeps darkness (pollution? bad weather?) away from his town. He took over the job from his father after the elder pig’s passing, and even though he is still in school, he has to reset the windmill twice daily to preserve the town. Sadly, all of the other animals in the school harass and tease the little pig; the reason is never clear although I guess the implication is that he’s a loner who prefers to keep to himself, and young people never seem to understand that impulse. The arrival of a new student, a little fox, changes the pig’s life when the two realize that they both like to draw. Although they would seem to be “natural” enemies—after all, a pig and a fox being friends?—but perhaps the message is that even opposites can have things in common. A misunderstanding separates them, and the pig doesn’t make it home in time to prevent the town from being immersed in darkness one day.  All is resolved happily eventually, and the fox and the pig enjoy their time alone in the large windmill. I don’t know how young a child could be and still understand the message of this film, but given how many young people we’ve lost in recent years to suicide because of bullying, I’m certain it would resonate with many, many people. You could easily “read” the friendship between the pig and the fox as the beginning of a budding romance, given that both of them are male, but most people would probably prefer to concentrate just upon their friendship.

Feast, a very polished entry from the United States, is a delight. A Disney short that aired before Big Hero 6 in theaters, it features the story of a puppy whose love of food propels the narrative. Unfortunately, what happens in its owner’s life determines what kind of food the little French bulldog gets. When it’s tiny and first rescued, the dog gets delicious scraps from the table, pretty much whatever the owner wants to eat since he’s a bachelor at the time, but when the owner gets a girlfriend (a waitress) the food switches to healthy food served with garnish. When the couple breaks up, the food doesn’t revert back to the meatballs and pizza the dog once enjoyed. The owner’s depression over the split prompts the dog, now grown bigger and seemingly wiser, to reunite the couple despite its fears that it will have to keep eating healthily. Later, though, the arrival of a baby in the house means the dog now gets to eat everything again, so he gets a happy ending after all. I would warn you not to watch this short if you’re hungry because the food, especially in the early scenes, looks delicious. What we’re watching here, of course, isn’t the story of the dog. It merely foregrounds the story of the couple’s relationship, but the choice to keep the dog as the central focus is a wise one. Anyone who loves dogs will enjoy watching the facial expressions on this one’s face.

Me and My Moulton tells the story of three sisters in Norway whose family life seems to them to be too different (i.e., strange) from their friends’ lives. Narrated by the 7-year-old middle daughter, this co-production of Norway and Canada brings into contrast the lives these girls lead as the children of architects when compared to their apparently wealthier neighbors. For example, everyone else in the area seems to have a bicycle, prompting repeated appeals to the girls’ parents to purchase them one as well. Unfortunately, the parents can’t afford an expensive bike and they can’t purchase one immediately, leading the narrator to bemoan why her parents aren’t more like everyone else’s. We learn, though, that the downstairs neighbors who seem to be so happy truly aren’t. Meanwhile, the girls and their parents live more simply and seem to enjoy each other’s company more. The arrival of the bicycle, the Moulton of the title, adds to the girl’s eventual realization that you should accept your situation in life. It might not be quite as bad as you imagine it to be. The animation for this short is rather simple, but the use of bright colors helps to heighten its impact. A few clever moments also add to the humor, especially the three-legged chairs that keep tipping over and depositing their sitters on the floor. The narrative doesn’t reveal anything particularly profound, but Me and My Moulton is enjoyable to watch.

A Single Life clocks in at little more than two minutes long and, to be honest, ended just about the time I figured out what was happening. A woman receives a 45 rpm single in the mail and puts it on her record player. When the record skips, if it moves forward in the song, she ages. If it skips backward, she becomes younger. That’s really it. Maybe there’s a message here about living in the moment rather than trying to move too quickly to your future or always trying to relive your past. However, given its quick running time, this short from the Netherlands doesn’t really have or take the time to have much of an impact. It’s cute and clever, but not much else. This is the slightest film in the category, and you have to wonder how the voters selected it over all of the other animated short films released in 2014.

Oscar Winner: Feast. This short is yet another example of the revived Disney tradition of quality short films to accompany its feature films.

My Choice: Feast. It’s beautifully drawn, which you cannot say about most of the other entries, and the story is beautifully resonant as well. 

American Sniper (2014)

I had a very complicated, almost divided reaction to American Sniper, which is based on the life of Chris Kyle, the most successful sniper in the history of the American military. The movie itself seems divided as well. Kyle (played by Bradley Cooper) managed to kill hundreds of Iraqis while trying to protect Marines and others who were a part of the war effort, yet he found himself increasingly unable to return to civilian life after each of his tours of duty. While the film doesn’t ostensibly seem to take any sides in the debate over the war itself, its depiction of Kyle’s single-minded dedication to his job as a killer struck me as troubling. We are asked both to accept the depth of his concern for the lives of those he protects in battle and to recognize that his career—particularly his remarkable skill and success at killing—is destroying his ability to have a “normal” existence with his family. I realize that the filmmakers were hewing very closely to the best-selling autobiography Kyle wrote, but the film makes little effort to make connections between what happens during war and what the consequences of those events are.

The center of the film is the performance by Cooper, who plays Kyle as a man who never questions what he is supposed to do in life. When he is younger, still a child, he obeys whatever his father tells him. His father is the one who teaches him how to shoot and how to not only defend himself but those who need defending. As a result, Kyle develops a rather strict moral code that he tends to follow for the rest of his life. For example, when he returns early from a rodeo weekend to discover a girlfriend cheating on him with another man, he throws out both the guy and then the girlfriend. He asks no questions and he refuses to accept her explanations; she has done something wrong, so she is no longer a part of his life—it’s that simple. He realizes that he has to look after his younger brother, and so he does. He knows that he’s supposed to go to church and read the Bible, so he does. He knows he needs to serve his country when he sees the attacks on our embassies, so he does. Later, when he and his wife watch the attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11, he doesn’t have to wonder what he should do. He knows that he will be going after the people who have attacked America and he will be trying to protect his wife and family.

Of course, such a story sounds incredibly simplistic. Were there never any thoughts, for example, that perhaps his father was too stern with his younger brother? (The father does seem to be ready to whip the little boy after he’s been bullied at school. All that saves him is their mother and the fact that Kyle has beaten up the bully to protect his sibling.)  Does he ever contemplate whether or not the United States is going after the right people by invading Iraq or does he just accept that what his commander-in-chief tells him is the truth? Where does the film grapple with these issues? They might have provided some context for understanding Kyle as a more realistic human being, but they are absent from American Sniper.

After the opening sequence (more on that later), the film follows a somewhat predictable chronological order. We see Kyle’s childhood, his enlistment and training, his courtship of his wife Taya (played by Sienna Miller), and then a series of tours of duty and returns to the States. Most of the choices for the overall plot are reasonable. However, the montage of how he and the other Navy SEALs are trained seemed rather, well, silly. I hope that the Navy actually toughens them up by means other than forcing them to sit in cold mud and lying in the ocean waves with their arms interlocked with fellow candidates. Yes, I realize that I don’t want someone to spray me with a hose while I’m trying to do leg lifts, but surely a SEAL goes through much more arduous training that what is shown here. Perhaps the Navy wouldn’t allow a depiction of the actual methods used for making enlistees into SEALs. You have to expect it’s a great deal more than this, though.

I tried for a while to keep count of the number of people that Kyle kills, but the numbers got too overwhelming too quickly. The ones that are shown, especially in a sequence involving a massive dust storm, are very tense moments. The film does an admirable job of depicting the dangers of war and the kinds of loss that the men and women who serve must make. It also opens our eyes to the kind of dedication that being in a war zone takes. A significant portion of the film focuses on the search for an Iraqi called “The Butcher” and Kyle’s plan to kill both The Butcher and his accomplice, a Syrian sharpshooter only known as Mustafa. Since the film uses these historical figures as part of the plot, you get to see just how close the Americans came at times to stopping some of the worst of the war criminals and how they felt when they lost out on an opportunity. To watch American Sniper is, to a large extent, to experience the sense of both the dedication and frustration that people like Kyle experienced.

The scenes of war are interspersed with scenes of Kyle’s life when he returns from a tour of duty. These moments are some of the most painful to watch, including a scene where his wife’s doctor tries to get him to seek some medical help or when a fellow soldier tries to get him to come to the local VA to talk with some other returned veterans. Kyle refuses all help because he thinks that he is fine even though almost anyone around him can tell that he is too tense and wary to be truly okay. What is difficult to determine is whether or not Kyle ever realized that his mental state back in the U.S. was being so severely affected by what he witnessed in war. He’s unable for long periods of time to share with his wife what he has seen and done, a sore spot in their relationship. He won’t acknowledge the losses of his comrades, and he even refuses to accept the thanks that he receives for all of the good that he has done on behalf of the other soldiers. When he makes a remarkable transformation after meeting with some wounded veterans, we aren’t given any information to let us know what has changed for him, just that he’s changed. It’s moments like this that I found most infuriating about this film. What prompted Kyle to leave the Navy and start working with his fellow veterans would have provided us some insight into what makes this man who he is, but the film leaves it to our imagination to wonder what has happened to make him such a different man.

The Iraq war has become a subject of a spate of recent movies, and it’s both tempting and difficult to compare them. If this film differs from The Hurt Locker, a film that won the Oscar for Best Picture just six years ago, it’s the greater emphasis on how difficult a time the soldiers have in adjusting back to civilian life. While The Hurt Locker placed more emphasis on how an adrenaline junkie like its main character finds life back at home boring, American Sniper really focuses on the sense of purpose someone like Kyle misses when not in country. Cooper, so very different in this film from much of his previous work, does manage to convey just how lost Kyle seems to feel when he’s not involved in helping his country and his countrymen in trying to stop what he sees as evil in the world.

Technically, the film is solid work overall. Director Clint Eastwood doesn’t tend to go for flashy cinematography and editing in his films. Even the special effects do not “stand out” as distinctive; they’re just what you would expect in a war movie, nothing more and nothing less. American Sniper is rather good old-fashioned classical Hollywood-style movie-making. There are a few exceptions here and there such as the opening sequence involving Kyle’s first kills: a boy and a woman who are trying to blow up some Marines on the ground. The camera allows us here—and at a couple of other times—to see what Kyle sees through his rifle’s scope, the limited amount of vision that he has to rely upon to make a decision that could be the difference between life and death and between glory and dishonor. After that sequence, though, the film reverts to a more standard biopic structure only to return briefly to this moment in Kyle’s life when it fits more properly into the story of his life.

In a way, it was a very savvy choice on the part of the filmmakers to withhold information that would or could have forced the audience to have only one narrow option for interpreting the film’s politics; it might have been easier to choose a side and present it relentlessly throughout the film. However, liberals and progressives can watch American Sniper and concentrate primarily upon the damage that war inflicts on its soldiers. They can pay close attention to Kyle’s difficulties in transitioning to civilian life and how some involvement with others who have had similar experiences is necessary in order for his healing to begin. They can use the film’s plot as evidence for additional funding for therapy and/or other approaches to helping returning veterans and even as an argument against war given the drastic impact that it has on its participants. By contrast, conservatives can emphasize Kyle’s level of devotion to his country, the kind of unquestioning patriotism that he exhibits. They can point to the level of sacrifice that it takes to serve one’s country, a willingness to give up all of the privileges of being an American in order to maintain the way of life that we have come to expect. They can describe the film’s plot as a testament to the need for more support, financial and otherwise, for the military and those who are serving on behalf of the United States and even as evidence for additional involvement in war efforts in order to continue preserving the culture that produces people like Kyle. Because of the somewhat enigmatic approach taken by the creators of the film, both sides can make their case, and in a sense, both will be correct. Some viewers, of course, will consider this ambiguity a failing of the film, but I would consider it the component that raises American Sniper from being a merely good or competently made film into one that raises rather than settles important questions about our involvement in war and the impact on the people who are most directly affected by it.

Oscar Win: Best Achievement in Sound Editing

Other Nominations: Best Motion Picture, Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role (Bradley Cooper), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Achievement in Sound Mixing, Best Achievement in Film Editing

Room (2015)

Room, adapted by writer Emma Donoghue from her own novel, has two distinct, equally emotional segments to its narrative. They stand in stark contrast to each other, with the first half very confined to a single small space and the latter half being set in the wider but sometimes just as frightening world. The filmmakers manage to keep the suspense taut throughout the film, though, even though the initial half could have easily been devolved into a kind of horror-film excess and the second part could have fallen into overly sentimental melodrama of the worst sort. Watching Room is not an upbeat experience, honestly, but what emerges is a powerful depiction of the kind of strength it takes to survive a hellish experience.

The first half of the film reveals itself in very measured steps as the audience comes to realize that a woman and her son are imprisoned in a 10-by-10 foot garden shed by a man they refer to as Old Nick. Old Nick kidnapped Joy (played by Brie Larson) seven years earlier and fathered Jack (played with great depth by newcomer Jason Tremblay) two years later. In order to protect Jack from the truth, Joy convinces her young son that the space that they call Room is actually the entire world, that there is no existence outside of the shed. She becomes increasingly desperate to escape from the forced malnutrition, power shut-offs, and repeated rapes (and other forms of violence), so she begins to reveal aspects of the truth of their situation to an initially skeptical Jack. The escape that they plot and execute provides a harrowing centerpiece to the film.

The second half is no less tense than the first. While the threat of constant physical danger may have been removed, both Joy and Jack have significant and challenging adjustments that they must make to their new existence. Joy, suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, finds it difficult to reintegrate into life with her mother (the great Joan Allen) and her mother’s new live-in boyfriend, Leo. She finds it difficult to express clearly how she’s feeling since she knows that no one could perhaps comprehend what she has endured for seven years. Jack has his own issues, given that he’s grown up in such an isolated environment. The world is such a mystery to him, one that he is initially reluctant to encounter directly. He has to build a sense of trust with other people besides his mother, but the transition is frightening.

There’s a powerful lesson here about what our imagination can do. Given only one skylight through which to experience the world, Joy and Jack initially have to make their own world. Joy’s initial creativity in explaining what they see on television, for example, demonstrates what a keen mind she has. To give her son more of a sense of the vastness and greatness of the world outside Room would lead to potentially destructive consequences. When she does begin to share more realistic details about the world, Jack’s ability to comprehend such matters goes a long way toward explaining how he has managed to survive locked away in the wardrobe at night when his mother is being raped a few feet away.

This film also makes a strong point about how much we come to depend upon each other. Jack, of course, needs his mother in order to survive. She fights for him by asking Old Nick to supply vitamins for the boy’s health and even to acknowledge the boy’s birthday. She decides it’s time to escape when she realizes that she and Jack can no longer live in the confining environment of Room. However, interestingly, Joy needs Jack almost as much. Without him, she might have given up years earlier. It’s his importance to her life that keeps her motivated to escape and get back to a “normal” existence. This doesn’t mean that the two of them are always happy with each other; it’s easy to get on each other’s nerves when you’re in contact with each other 24 hours a day. Even after the escape, the bond between them is at times intense and needy and supportive and exhausting. When it is no longer just the two of them, they still cling to each other and get frustrated with each other.

The performance by Tremblay as Jack is integral to the success of the film. He’s astonishingly good without demonstrating a sort of “Hollywood precociousness.” He reacts the way that a five-year-old boy might react, and the way that he plays with his toys or bounces around a room would be familiar to anyone with a little boy in the family. Had Tremblay given a less nuanced performance, Room would have nowhere near the emotional impact that it ultimately has. We have to experience a great deal of the narrative through Jack’s perspective, and Tremblay shows us with amazing clarity what it is like to experience the world for the first time, how confusing and exciting that can be. He would have been a formidable candidate for Best Actor in a Leading Role had he been nominated, but Hollywood (and the Oscars, as a subset of it) has a long, sad history of ignoring child actors with this kind of depth.

All of the performances in the film are first rate. Larson has been justifiably recognized by many awards groups for her performance, including the Oscars, and she and Tremblay receive able support from Allen as Joy’s mother, who reveals a full history of her own brand of suffering and pain in the way she reacts to her daughter’s return. It’s good to see Allen even in such a small role; she always is such a welcome presence to a film. William H. Macy gets only a couple of quick moments as Joy’s father, but he provides an interesting counterpoint to the happy-you’re-free response from the other characters. He is the astringent that wipes away the possibility that everyone will be supportive of Joy and, particularly, Jack, making the overall film more realistic in its tone. Even Sean Bridgers as Old Nick brings an essential villainous presence to the first half without resorting to stereotype; there’s a true sense of relief when he disappears halfway through the film.

The challenge of filming in such a small space as Room could have been (and probably was) quite daunting. The production design team has created a remarkable environment within the garden shed, with the kinds of touches that demonstrates a keen attention to the kinds of details that would evolve over a seven-year span of time in such a confining space. The child’s drawings on the wall, the egg shell snake created as a craft project to distract Jake, the small area that serves as a kitchen—all of them and many other touches blend together to give a sense of a room truly being lived in. Similar kudos go to the costume design team, particularly for the clothes that Jack wears while he and his mother are still in Room. You can imagine what limits there would have been to these two captives and how they would have been more creative in what to wear each day.

The Hollywood version of this film would undoubtedly have had a more upbeat ending; there is a reason, after all, that they’re called “Hollywood endings.” However, as an independent film with a strong undercurrent of international funding support (Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, etc.), Room provides a muted ending more appropriate to the situation being depicted. It’s not that there isn’t a sense of happiness or even optimism earned by the ending; it’s just that everything couldn’t be tidy and completely resolved to everyone’s satisfaction and still stay true to the spirit of the rest of the story.

Oscar Win: Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role (Brie Larson),

Other Oscar Nominations: Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Achievement in Directing (Lenny Abrahamson), Best Adapted Screenplay

State Fair (1933)

The 1933 version of State Fair is the first of three movie versions of the novel by Philip Strong about an Iowa family’s journey to the titular annual event. I prefer the 1945 musical version myself because it includes some amazing songs (“It Might as Well Be Spring,” “It’s a Grand Night for Singing”) and good performances by Jeanne Crain, Dana Andrews, and Dick Haymes, among others. The 1962 film features Ann-Margaret and Pat Boone and switches the action to Texas rather than Iowa. However, the earliest version is the only one to have garnered a Best Picture nomination, and without the success of this first film, the others would never likely never have been made.

State Fair (to be clear, I’m talking about the one from 1933) is ostensibly a comedy with some romantic and dramatic elements included for good measure. A frame story shows the Frake family’s preparations for the Iowa State Fair and their reactions after returning home. It’s the middle part of the film that depicts the fair itself, and it’s the most significant part of the narrative in terms of the plot complications. As such, the fair provides a brief escape, a sort of vacation, from the drudgery of the real world. Anything might be possible at the fair, and you don’t have to live by the usual “rules” of society when you’re there and far away from your home.

Initially, each member of the family has a reason to be excited about the upcoming fair. The father, Abel (played with cornpone charm by Will Rogers), has been raising a Hampshire boar that he hopes will be named Grand Champion. The mother, Melissa (Louise Dresser, nicely understated), has various pickles and mincemeat recipes that she hopes will garner her some ribbons for her cooking prowess. The brother, Wayne (Norman Foster, grating with his exaggerated accent and hick-like behavior), has been practicing tossing hoops for a year in order to get back at the carnival barker who tricked him at the previous year’s fair. Finally, the daughter, Margy (Janet Gaynor, a true movie star and a fine actress), just wants to have some adventure in her life before she possibly settles for marrying a local dairy farmer.

Abel makes a $5 bet (no doubt, a lot of money in 1933) with the local store owner that everyone in the Frake family will have a great time at the fair and everyone will reach the goals each has established for going to the fair. The film seems to ask if it is possible for everything to turn out the way you want it to, if you can always achieve what you set out to do, and the answer, apparently, is that it depends. Raising such a question means, of course, that there must be complications for each of the four main characters. For example, a significant portion of the plot—perhaps too much of the plot—is taken up with Blue Boy, Abel’s prize-worthy pig, who seems lethargic when at the fair. Abel even sleeps in the pen with the pig to make certain that it’s okay. It’s only when another pig, Esmerelda, appears that Blue Boy springs back to life. Can pigs fall in love? State Fair seems to suggest that they can; it certainly suggests that they can talk to each other. There are at least two lengthy passages involving these two pigs grunting, certainly some of the oddest “romantic” dialog to appear on film.

Rogers, one of the most famous personalities from the first half of the 20^th Century, is rather too “aw shucks, ma” in his performance. He’s not a particularly good actor, to be honest, often stumbling over his lines, but he does seem to be enjoying himself being around the fairgrounds, and there’s some cute interplay between him and Dresser in the second half of the film. Dresser’s storyline as Melissa Frake is rather simple, but she makes the most of the clichéd part of homemaker who wants recognition for her skills. Melissa faces some stiff competition from another woman who is apparently famous in Iowa for her pickles and mincemeat too. However, all it takes is some blue ribbons and a plaque for Melissa to state, without apparent irony, “I’ve got the most that any woman can get in life. There’s nothing left to come to the fair again for.” That suggests the kinds of limitations placed on women during the time period of the film. Little wonder then that her daughter might consider wanting more in life than a bit of blue ribbon and a statewide reputation for prize-winning pickles.

The most compelling thread in the plot involves Gaynor’s Margy. Her life seems out of her control; everyone expects her to marry Harry, but she doesn’t love him. Harry has always loved her, and he certainly seems devoted to her, but he represents a safe choice, a mundane future, a continuation of the existence she’s always known. You can tell from Gaynor’s facial expressions that Margy is a dreamer, someone who wants to have some excitement in her life. When she looks at the sky during the truck ride to the fair, it’s easy for the audience to comprehend just how more she wants out of life, more than perhaps even one week at the fair can provide. Margy meets a newspaperman played by Lew Ayres on a roller coaster, and they decide to have fun enjoying the fair together. No strings, no expectations—they just plan to see what the fair has to offer visitors. She admits that she has a boyfriend back home, and he confesses to having had several lovers in the past. You know that won’t prevent them from falling in love with each other, but one of the true joys of the film is watching a relationship develop between their young characters. Both Gaynor and Ayres (in one of his earlier film roles) are quite charming.

Meanwhile, the most shocking plotline involves Wayne. He won a cheap “pearl-handled” revolver the year before, and he takes full advantage of the opportunity to humiliate the carny running the hoop toss game. He’s gotten quite good at a rather useless skill, but the scene is really just designed to set up a burgeoning romance between Wayne and a trapeze artist. They have quite the sexual relationship throughout the duration of the fair, and the film, being made prior to the adoption of the Production Code, is rather daring in its depiction of what’s going on between Wayne and Emily. It’s quite a contrast between their relationship and the far more chaste one involving Margy and Ayres’ Pat. Margy and Pat, for example, seemingly only share kisses, nothing more. Wayne and Emily go much, much farther than that.

The existing print, at least the one shown periodically on Turner Classic Movies, is in pretty bad shape. There are numerous cuts and jumps that eliminate some dialog and some images. It makes for some rocky watching at times. The use of soft-focus cinematography in the farm scenes is also noteworthy. The edges are slightly out of focus in these scenes. Perhaps it’s an attempt to idealize the agrarian existence depicted in the film. The scenes at the fair so seem sharper or flatter.

The fair itself is an intriguing artifact here. We get to see the carnies putting up the tents, setting up the shows and games. These scenes are one of the few places that African-Americans appear in the film—well, and some blackface performers at the fair. There are also some melancholy shots of the empty fair after it has closed. Much of this atmospheric footage came from the 1932 Iowa State Fair, and these sequences serve as a realistic backdrop for the action involving the four main characters. For example, one of the best examples of how footage from the state fair is integrated into the film involves Pat and Margy attending the horse races. This is an exciting sequence with lots of energy, reminiscent in some ways of the chariot races in Ben-Hur.

Even though the film was nominated for a screenplay Oscar, some of the dialog is truly cringe-inducing. For example, on the way to the fair, Mrs. Frake encourages Margy to spread a blanket on the floor of the back of the truck, which she and her brother are sharing with Blue Boy (thankfully, caged). Margy, naturally, balks, only to have her father respond with “It ain’t everybody gets a chance to sleep alongside of a hog like that.” Probably not, but it depends upon whether you mean a literal “hog” or not, I suppose. The funniest dialog centers around Wayne’s claim that he’s seeing one of his male friends from the previous year’s fair when he’s really seeing Emily, the trapeze artist. This leads to some rather intriguing statements from his mother, several of which sound faintly homoerotic. For instance, when Margy gets upset that Wayne hasn’t accompanied her to the fair, Mrs. Frake says, “You know a boy has to go around and meet other fellows.” Indeed, some boys do just that at a fair. My favorite line, though, occurs when Wayne says he’s going to spend the night with this male friend on the final evening of the fair. Mrs. Frake’s assertion that “I bet you boys just fool around and don’t get a wink of sleep” is surprisingly on target for what’s been going on with Wayne and Emily, but can you imagine the implications of a mother saying that to a grown young man nowadays and not being the subject of some quizzical looks? Still, it’s this kind of dialog that makes even modern-day audiences laugh, just perhaps not in the way that audiences originally did in 1933.

Oscar Nominations: Best Picture, Best Writing (Adaptation)

Best Animated Short Film of 2013

Feral is really quite an ugly film. I thought it was poorly drawn and poorly animated, almost amateurish in its execution. I suppose some would call it experimental, but to me, the experiment failed. The film tells the story of a boy raised by wolves who is “adopted” and brought to civilization, only to have his adoptive father discover that the animal he has been raised to be still resides within him. I suppose it’s a meditation on our true natures and a bit of a rehash of the nature-versus-nurture debate. I just couldn’t find it all that interesting, and I even started to pay way too much attention to the child’s teeth, which he bares much too frequently. The murky nature of the wordless movie isn’t helped by the somewhat clichéd storyline, and the limited color palette (mostly just dark greys and blacks) makes for an unpleasant viewing experience.

Get a Horse! is a fun, lovely tribute to the history of animation, from flip books to 3-D technology. Mickey Mouse and Minnie and friends are enjoying an old-fashioned hay ride when they are attacked by Peg Leg Pete. This Disney short features such a fascinating mix of different styles from different eras, ranging from the black-and-white early versions of these characters and others in the Disney fold to the bright, glossy, brilliant colors used today. The clever way that the film incorporates the past and the present into its plot, especially during one particularly raucous session involving jumping in and out of the movie screen, makes this short perhaps the most fun to watch. It’s an absolutely charming film that tells a great story and uses our long-standing love of cartoons to captivate us.

Mr. Hublot might be an homage to the French character of Mr. Hulot, but this short is really a tightly focused examination of how seemingly innocent small actions can have a profound influence on our day-to-day existence. Mr. Hublot lives alone in what appears to be an abandoned warehouse building. Actually, all of the buildings in this film appear to be abandoned warehouses, but I digress. The film is set during some sort of mechanized future, and Mr. Hublot, who appears to be at least partially mechanical himself, suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder or anal retentiveness, which means that he has a very specific routine that he follows each day. Only when he adopts an abandoned robot dog does the rigid pattern of his life become more broken and actually happier. As the dog keeps growing bigger and bigger, Mr. Hublot has to keep finding ways to adjust, and the film keeps trying to make a sweet statement about making room for new experiences in our lives.

Possessions begins with a samurai trapped in a rainstorm seeking shelter in an apparently abandoned home. It’s a small structure, but one with a lot of life still inside it. All of the objects in the house are seemingly possessed—hence the title. There’s a series of umbrellas that the samurai repairs, covering up the eyes that peek through the rips and tears in the fabric. He’s attacked by yards of fabric and must sew the pieces together to fashion a beautiful robe. He’s also forced to confront a dragon made of junk that keeps emitting foul odors. Once I learned that this film was sort of a prototype for a videogame, I understood why I found it hard to stay awake while watching it. Despite being rather beautiful at times, it’s actually pretty slow moving, but I’m assuming the game console will help to speed things along.

Room on the Broom is another film from the makers of The Gruffalo, a short that was nominated in this same category in 2010. Gillian Anderson voices a witch who is traveling with her cat and encounters a series of animals who all want to join her on the broom. Eventually, the witch and the cat wind up with a dog, a green bird, and very fastidious frog riding along with them, and that makes for some difficulties taking off and landing and with keeping items on the broom itself. There’s also a dragon who chases them and causes a lot of havoc. Anderson doesn’t get to speak very much, and it’s the cat who steals the movie with its expressive face, particularly its marvelous sense of exasperation at having to share the broom with the other characters. This is a charming film, but it’s a bit repetitive and is obviously aimed at smaller children.

Oscar Winner: Mr. Hublot. This choice continues a trend in recent years of choosing dystopian kinds of shorts to honor. I found it to be an interesting film overall, but it doesn’t engage one’s heart so much as one’s mind. It’s mostly an intellectual exercise with, admittedly, a few delights.

My Choice: Get a Horse! is a loving tribute to the growth and development of animation since its beginnings in the 1920s. It’s a technologically advanced film which nevertheless seeks to set a nostalgic tone. This is a perfectly delightful little movie and the most fully realized vision of any of the nominees. I particularly loved that the black-and-white image that begins the film is displayed by plush red curtains of the kind you might have seen in a very upscale theater at the start of moviegoing.

Best Live Action Short Films of 2013

Even though Aguel No Era Yo (That Wasn't Me) is a Spanish film, most of its action takes place in Africa and much of its dialogue is in English, making it perhaps the most international of the five nominees. Two doctors/medical aid workers and their guide are taken prisoner in an unnamed African country by a group of boy soldiers and their leader, the General. Most of the boys are in the General's "army" because they have apparently been orphaned in ongoing civil violence against the government, and they have fallen under the spell of a man who has taken over the role of stern father figure who pumps them up with claims of future glory and reward. The sequence of events involving and following the kidnapping is quite harrowing to watch. Part of the film is set years after the kidnapping, as one of the boy soldiers, "Corporal" Kaney, recounts for a school assembly what his experiences were like and how he had to disassociate himself psychologically to do some of the brutal actions that he did. This is a very intriguing film about an issue that deserves great attention, and it could easily be expanded into a full length film.

The longest short—yes, I realize how oxymoronic that sounds—Is the French film Avant Que de Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything). It concerns the attempt by Miriam, a department store clerk, to escape with her two children from an abusive relationship. That they are on the run is not apparent until about ten minutes into this thirty-minute gem of a movie. We can sense that something stressful is happening as Miriam picks up her son Julien, who is skipping school, and her daughter Josephine, who is distraught over having to leave her boyfriend. After she arrives at the store and tries to get some of her salary in order to have money to leave, Miriam and her daughter and son face a series of tension-building moments. One of the most intriguing aspects of this short is its ability to delineate sharply the different personalities of Miriam's co-workers. It's a masterful film, full of strong performances and depth of characterization.

Helium is a touching film about the friendship between Enzo, a hospital janitor, and Alfred, a terminally ill little boy whose room Enzo cleans. After sensing Alfred's fear of death, Enzo begins telling the boy about a place called Helium, an obvious allegory for Heaven but one which uses the boy's love of airships and hot air balloons to comfort him. This Danish film depicts the make-believe world of Helium in enchanting detail; it reminded me at times of a sunnier, sparklier version of those islands in the air of Avatar. Enzo enlists the help of one of Alfred's nurses so that he can tell Alfred the entire story that he's made up, and the final shot is quite touching.

Pitaako Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? (Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?) clocks in at just about seven minutes long, but it manages to pack in a lot of action in that brief period. This Finnish film shows the frantic preparations a family makes to get to a wedding on time. Almost everything goes wrong from the moment that they fail to wait up when the alarm clock rings. My favorite moment occurs when the two daughters, after their mother has told them to put on the kinds of clothes people wear to parties (because the nice dresses they were going to wear the wedding are still in the washing machine), emerge dressed as a witch and as Pippi Longstocking. It's a cute but rather insubstantial film.

The Voorman Problem is the only one of the films with international star power. Martin Freeman, taking a break from his Hobbit duties, portrays a psychiatrist called to a prison to examine the title character played by Tom Hollander. Voorman claims that he is a god or the God, and Freeman's Dr. Williams must determine whether or not to have the prisoner declared insane before he causes a riot among the inmates who have started to accept Voorman's claims. A lot of this short is just Freeman and Hollander (usually confined by a straitjacket) talking across a table, but there are a couple of moments that flesh out Dr. Williams' life outside the prison walls, and there are several contemporary references that date the events being depicted. It's a clever enough film, I suppose, but it coasts primarily on the charm of its two lead actors, and the twist at the end is not as surprising as the filmmakers might have expected it to be.

Oscar Winner: Helium. This is a heartfelt film that displays a great deal of tenderness toward the boy and his fears of dying. Handling such delicate subject matter requires a difficult balancing act, and this short film is always honest in its depictions of what the boy and the janitor are experiencing. 

My Choice: Either Aguel No Era Yo and Avant Que de Tout Perdre. Both are fully developed, fully realized stories that are gripping and intense. I'd have a tough time choosing between them, given that they are both quite polished work and deal with important subject matter (maybe that should be Important Subject Matter) in such an emotional yet sincere way. I'd probably give a slight edge to the French film because the characters are so well written and realistic in their actions. 

Black Swan (2010)

Black Swan is a psychological thriller set in the world of ballet, a fact that was readily evident from the film’s trailer. It involves a ballerina chosen to perform the lead in a production of Swan Lake and the emotional difficulties she has adjusting to her new fame and the pressure that comes with it. I am not that familiar with the Tchaikovsky ballet, to be honest, but apparently the female lead must portray two roles, the White Swan and the Black Swan. The White Swan is good, as you might suspect, and the Black Swan is evil and/or bad. Having your differing sides color-coded always makes things easier for viewers. The film certainly seems to favor the Black Swan as we watch the young woman chosen for this star-making role gradually take on more and more of the traits associated with the darker half of the role.

Natalie Portman plays Nina, the young ballerina plucked from the corps to play the Swan Queen in both her white and black incarnations. Portman has always struck me as a particularly fragile presence on screen, and that personality type is used to good advantage in this film. She's both excited and intimidated by the prospect of her shot at stardom. It's a dream she's always had or, at least, one that her mother has always had, and she's determined to be, in her words, "perfect" in the role. Unfortunately for Nina, her idea of perfection is technical in nature, not emotional, and her inability to understand how to mine the depths of her personality becomes an increasingly larger problem. Portman's performance becomes increasingly edgy throughout the film as Nina becomes more emotionally unhinged. It's a risky job of acting, one that she carries out with distinction.

The ballet company's artistic director, played by Vincent Cassel, originally tells Nina that he would have chosen her had the part only been the White Swan. Nina's technique in that role is flawless, and she has the innocence and naivete for the part. It's the Black Swan, the more sensual, passionate half of the role that she has difficulties with. He initially taunts her by telling her he's given the part to another dancer, only to have Nina become aggressive when he makes advances. It turns him on a bit, so he decides to give her a chance at the role. How very French of him. I know that sounds like a bit of a dig, but the movie itself loves to use our preconceived ideas of the French, of ballet dancers, of domineering mothers, of almost every group depicted, actually, as shortcuts to plot development. Cassel's Thomas is a Frenchman and a straight man in the world of ballet, so he's going to bed as many different women as possible. Don't act surprised when you see it on the screen.

Naturally, there is a rival for the part, a dancer named Lily, played with aggressive sunniness and looseness by Mila Kunis, formerly one of the stars of TV's That 70s Show. Kunis received a lot of praise for her performance, and she is certainly good in the part, but save for the extended sequence where she takes Portman's Nina out for a night of fun in order to loosen the newly minted star up a bit, she doesn't really get a lot to do in the film except to keep trying to befriend Nina. I like Kunis as an actress, but I think she is perhaps best suited to comedic roles. She does inject a liveliness to her role here, and you can certainly see why Thomas would be intrigued by her for the role of the Black Swan. After all, it's a film about the ballet and there must be a rival, and she must be almost the polar opposite of the star. Lily is certainly no innocent.

Since it's a film about the ballet, there must also be jealousy on the part of the other members of the corps who wonder how Nina managed to get a part when they are *sniff* obviously more talented. And there must be an aging ballet star who has stayed around just a bit too long and is scheduled to perform for the final time. In this film, it's Winona Ryder in the part of Beth. Beth is unsurprisingly upset that a new and younger girl will be taking on a part that she would feel is "rightly" hers. You should have already guessed that Beth and Thomas have a past, and you ought to suspect that Nina is going to have idolized Beth until she replaces her (in so many, many different aspects of life). I was shocked to see Ryder in this film, not because the thought of her as a ballerina is too foreign, though. She's just such a shrill presence. When you look back on her earlier film career, it's a surprise to see her as a drunken harpy in the few moments she's allowed on the screen.

I could spend some time talking about Barbara Hershey's domineering mother, but frankly, the whole domineering mother theme is appalling. Why must every mother who tries to see her daughter succeed be portrayed as some sort of brutalizing monster? It isn't that Hershey isn't good in the part. She's always been a remarkable actress capable of conveying the most subtle of emotions to an audience. Here, though, she's reduced to the kind of woman who overreacts to everything her daughter says and does and who brings out the scissors (her weapon of choice to trim sharp nails) every time she sees her daughter has scratched herself. The scenes involving those scissors got to be a bit too much after a while. I kept expecting them to be used as a murder weapon or something.

The plot begins to reveal moments that may have happened or may only be figments of Nina's unbalanced psyche. It's not easy to tell exactly when you begin to realize that things seem to be getting weird but that they may have only been the imaginings of Nina's fevered brain. It’s possible, as some have posited, that the entire movie may have all been a part of Nina's imagination. That might be going a bit too far, given that so many details are grounded in what passes for reality in movies these days. Viewers gradually start to notice that they can no longer "trust" everything shown on the screen as being "real." When that occurs is probably an indication of just how long you think Nina has been falling apart.

Visually, the film is a stunner. It has a shimmering quality that is particularly appealing. The sequences that feature moments from rehearsals or from the ballet itself are depicted beautifully and are quite impressive. It is always difficult to render another art form on film, such as painting or musical composition, but ballet seems to be a lovely fit for film. Watching a moment like the one where Nina prepares a new set of ballet slippers is intriguing, and this movie has lots of little touches like that to make the world of these dancers seem more fully realized on screen.

There's much to praise about this film, honestly, but it doesn't strike me as one of the most outstanding cinematic achievements of 2010. The performances are good, certainly, and the overall look of the film has received careful attention. Yet there's nothing really new about the links between creativity and madness. Even Plato discussed that thousands of years ago. We have seen numerous films over the years about the lengths to which a performer will go to achieve what he or she considers to be perfection. Black Swan offers us nothing particularly new in that respect either. I suppose you could make a case for this being one of the first wide-release films to address the issue of lesbianism rather than gay male sexuality in the ballet, but even that is problematic given what occurs after that scene between Nina and Lily. No, overall, this film doesn't really seem to advance the art of cinema. It does provide a couple of hours of intriguing, at times melodramatic entertainment, and that's frequently sufficient for Academy voters, with their penchant for finding what appeals to middlebrow intellects.

Oscar Win: Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role (Natalie Portman)

Other Oscar Nominations: Best Motion Picture, Best Achievement in Directing, Best Achievement in Cinematography, and Best Achievement in Film Editing