Watching the annual crop of Academy Award-nominated animated shorts is always a treat. But this year’s films made me wonder why it is that animated shorts are allowed to be both entertaining and thought-provoking, while feature-length animated films are generally disposable?
Making the rounds in cinemas over the next few weeks is the 2010 Oscar Shorts program, a compilation of both live-action and animated shorts up for this year’s Academy Awards.
One of the favorites in the animated category is Spain’s entry, The Lady and the Reaper.
Claymation is just another word for artistic insanity. It takes the hand of a sculptor, the timing of an editor, the heart of a storyteller and the vision of a great director.
Nick Park, then, would be a mad genius. He has been nominated for six Oscars for his animated films, and won four. I hope he has room for another.
We live in a branded world. In fact, if you consciously counted every single logo you saw in any given day, chances are you’d be both amazed and appalled. The average American can identify the Apple logo at a glance, but couldn’t tell you who the British Prime Minister is.
But the Oscar-nominated animated short film Logorama turns our product-placement-driven society on its head, creating a world of anarchy, violence and chaos.
