Best Animated Short 2019 - The Shortlist

Well, it's been a while since I posted. I haven't posted anything since Richard Williams's passing back in August. I didn't even post when Cartoon Brew posted the list of films that they know have qualified for the Oscar. I know I had posted about the longlist in the past, but it took forever to put together, and it really didn't present anything new. And besides, how can I top Alex Dudok de Wit, the son of Oscar winner Michael Dudok de Wit? I suppose I could have made a post where I linked to that page and said "Hey, Cartoon Brew had published a list of films they knew had qualified for the Oscar," but I didn't.

Anyways, the Academy has long announced the shortlist of films that will be progressing for further consideration for the Academy Award nomination. They had previously made the list known late in November, but recently they have waited until mid-December to announce the shortlist for multiple categories, including Best Animated Short. This year's Shortlist Day happened to fall on Monday, December 16. Alas, I was away from my computer all day so I could not make this post to preview the ten films. So the post will go up a day late. Obviously Cartoon Brew had already made a post and given their two cents, but I suppose I will do the same.

RIP Richard Williams (1933-2019)

As you all might have heard, and as a few of you still-loyal readers have reminded me, a week ago we lost one of the titans in the world of animation. On August 16, 2019, Richard Williams passed away at the age of 86. I suppose it's meaningless that I will be writing this over a week after his death, but given the stature as one of the most influential and innovative figures in the world of animation, I'll be remiss if I didn't leave something on my blog, especially given that Williams has won an Oscar in this very category.

Best Animated Short - 2018 - BAO

I'll confess that I was less enthused about the Oscars this year than the years past. I'm not entirely sure why, but it may be because I'm focusing more on other interests such as baseball, My Little Pony, and video games? I had considered skipping the Oscars entirely and just watching who won Best Animated Short online, especially as the Academy was considering presenting some categories during commercial breaks, but in the end I decided to tune in for the whole thing. That still meant that Best Animated Short was the category I'm most anticipating. And of course presenters Aquafina and John Mulaney called it a big one. And of course I have to present the winner? And the winner this year?

Bao

Best Animated Short - 2018

Well today's the big day! It's the day of the Oscar announcement, and the day we find out what five films will join in the annals of Oscar history of Best Animated Short nominees. Well, it's been three hours since the nominations were announced, so that isn't that much of a surprise anymore. However, this was an unprecedented year and all ten of the shortlisted films were made available for public consumption. Some of the films have been taken down by now, but as a result for the third time since I've been following this category, I have seen all five nominees on the day of the nomination announcement, and I can go ahead and post my review. I may try to make a showing, just because I do really like this particular crop of nominees.

As far as the rest of the nominations go, I'm afraid I haven't kept up with life action films as much. I do know that the Academy dropped their plans for a Best Popular Film category and just went ahead and nominated Black Panther for the award. The only other Best Picture nominee I saw was Bohemian Rhapsody and was somewhat underwhelmed. Yes, I still haven't seen BlackkKlansman, The Favourite, Green Book, Roma, A Star is Born, or Vice. I am 5/5 on the Best Animated Feature nominees: Incredibles 2, Isle of Dogs, Mirai, Ralph Breaks the Internet, and Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse. I will note that Mirai is the first animated film from Japan not made by Studio Ghibli to get a nomination in this category. Unfortunately, I still think Wolf Children is Mamoru Hosoda's stronger film.

And in case you're wondering, the Studio Ghibli films that got a nomination were Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, The Wind Rises, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya, and When Marnie was There.

Anyways, I don't have much else to say about the other films, so let's just go to the reviews.