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Less is More: Film Reviews of Oscar Nominated Live Action Shorts
By Geoff Carter
My wife and I have made it an annual tradition to trek to the local movie theater and see the Oscar-nominated Best Short Subject Films, both the animated and live action categories. Not only is it a treat to see the latest in animation trends and techniques, but the entire genre of short film is also a refreshing way to experience the cinema, sort of like enjoying short stories instead of a novel. My brother gave me a Dashiell Hammett omnibus for Christmas last year, and it’s the last thing I read before I go to bed at night.
Hammett is a very economical writer whose stories, especially his earlier ones, lay down only the most necessary plot points. His main character, the Continental Op—the antecedental Sam Spade, doesn’t even have a name. All we know about him is that he’s good at his job and a little overweight. Hammett’s stories are short, succinct, and powerful, but don’t get me wrong. I have nothing against strong and thorough character development—in the right place—but short stories, like the movie shorts, don’t have to give us any more detail than is absolutely necessary to make their points. The narrative is concentrated
“The Red Balloon” by Albert Lamorisse is a perfect case in point. In this charming little film, a young Parisian boy untangles a red helium-filled balloon from a lamp post and soon realizes that the toy has a mind of its own. It follows the boy everywhere he goes like a devoted dog until its devotion to the young man leads to its eventual demise. The viewer does not need to know how the balloon has become a sentient being or what the boy is thinking—except in a very elemental way, or why no one else thinks a smart balloon is weird. That knowledge is not necessary to the narrative. We accept the story as it is.
This year’s Academy Award nominees for Live Action Short films were “Ivalu”, “Night Ride”, “Le Pupille”, “The Red Suitcase”, and “An Irish Goodbye”. Some of these films can be seen at home on streaming channels like Hulu, Prime Video, or Netflix, but some can also be seen on the Shorts Channel available through some streaming providers.
“Ivalu” by Anders Walter and Rebecca Pruzan is a Danish film about a young indidgenous girl’s search for her missing sister. After waking one morning to find her sister gone, Pipaluk, a young indigenous girl, searches the village for her but is frustrated until she wakes one morning to see a raven outside her window. Convinced the bird is Ivalu’s spirit, she follows it to all the places the girls played together. At each, Pipaluk remembers more about what her sister told her—especially the warnings. Eventually, Pipaluk understands what happened to Ivalu and why. She also understands there is nothing to be done about it except to carry Ivalu’s memory—and her warnings—with her. This conclusion is echoed by the silent, barren, and beautiful mountains and glaciers of her native land.
In fact, the austere and beautiful landscapes of Greenland almost become a character, grudgingly giving up Ivalu’s secrets to Pipaluk. It is a beatiful but sad film.
“Night Train”, a Norwegian film written and directed by Eirik Tveiten, begins as Ebba, a young woman afflicted with dwarfism attempts to board a tram on a cold winter night. When the conductor leaves for a break, closing the tram doors, and leaving Ebba in the freezing cold, she sneaks in, and curious, starts playing with the controls, accidentally setting the tram in motion. Afraid of being detained for stealing the tram, Ebba continues operating it, picking up passengers, including Allan and Benjamin, two rude young cads, and Ariel, a young trans woman. After Allan discovers that Ariel is not a woman, he begins harassing her. Intimidated at first, Ebba evenually tricks Allan and Benjamin into taking over the controls while she and Ariel sneak off.
This is a witty and beautifully rendered tongue-in-cheek David -vs- Goliath story. As Ebba, Sigrid Kandal Husjord conveys the perfect balance of bewilderment, fear, and chutzpah as she metaphorically rescues Ariel and herself from the forces of hate and discrimination.
“Le Pupille” written and directed by Alice Rohrwacher, is the story of a group of young girls living in a Catholic orphanage in World War II Italy. While the girls are constantly reprimanded and berated by the resident nuns, especially the Mother Superior, who is having difficulties making them be good girls, as she understands it, but the girls cannot help being children. When the daily radio news report is accidentally interrupted by Sarafina (Alba Rohrwacher), the new girl, and starts playing music, the girls start dancing and singing along. When the nuns discover them, they are disciplined. After posing in an angelic tableau in order to raise money for the parish, one parishioner attempts to elicit prayers for her lover, presenting a huge cake as an offering to the church.
Even though it is Christmas, the Mother Superior thinks the cake is sinful and coerces the girls to say it would be better to give it away. Except for Sarafina. At risk of exposing spoilers, suffice it to say the girl finds a wonderfully simple and generous way of celebrating the Chrismas holiday.
This short film resonates with the energy, exuberance, and undeniability of youth. As the nuns try—mostly unsuccessfully—to harness their good intentions, the short and very sweet message of this movie is that they don’t have to. Goodness is bone deep.
“The Red Suitcase” is a harrowing French film by Cyrus Neshvad about Ariane, a sixteen-year-old girl who has been sent by her family into an arranged marriage as she arrives at the Luxembourg Airport. Clutching her red suitcase which contains her treasured artwork, Ariane engages in a game of cat and mouse, trying to escape her would-be husband, throughout the airport. Determined to live her own life, knowing no one and penniless, Ariane manages to slip onto the passenger compartment of a bus as her pursuer is hot on her heels.
This film packs a lifetime of suspense into one hour of Ariane’s life. From the moment she removes her hijab in the bathroom, the audience knows that Ariane feels she must escape her fate, no matter the cost.
The final nominee for live action film is the touching and hilarious “An Irish Goodbye” by Tom Berkeley and Ross White, tells the tale of two grown brothers who have just lost their mother. Turlough (Seamus O’Hara), the older brother, has returned from London in order to settle his mother’s affairs, including the sale of the small farm she owned. His younger brother Lorcan (James Martin), who has Down Syndrome, is determined to stat on the farm even though arrangements have been made for him to live with an aunt. He brothers argue about it until Father O’Shea, the eccentric local priest, produces a bucket list written by their mother before she passed away. At Lorcan’s insistence, Turlough agrees to finish the list on their mother’s behalf. In the course of taking Tai Chi, smoking pot, painting, and even skydiving, the brothers rediscover each other, themselves, and the joys of their past. It turns out to be no goodbye at all—an Irish goodbye.
While stories concerning one woman’s right to live as she would, two brothers renewing brotherly bonds, two marginalized citizens finding justice, a native girl’s final escape from her torment, and the inherent goodness of children (even in the face of religion) cannot be more disparate, their diversity speaks to the wonderful range of the medium; not just film, but short film, a concentrated narrative structure that brings home the vagaries of the human condition as quickly and powerfully as a right jab to the jaw. These films are a wonderful experience. They are bite-sized—but nutritious and filling—treats.