'Oscar Nominated Shorts 2021: Live Action': Film Review

In his 92 years, African-American businessman Horace Bowers Sr.—one of the two main subjects of the Oscar-nominated short documentary A Concerto Is a Conversation—has faced many obstacles in his path. He’s always found a way around them.

When Judy Heumann—one of the main subjects of the Oscar-nominated documentary Crip Camp—was five years old in the early 1950s, her mother tried to register her for kindergarten in New York City. The staff took one look at Judy, who used a wheelchair as a result of polio, and denied her.

Haley Bosselman editorAcademy Award-nominated documentary “Hunger Ward” paints an intimate portrait of the children in Yemen suffering from starvation and malnourishment as a result of war-induced famine.

Darius Marder’s Sound of Metal went into 2019’s Toronto International Film Festival without a distributor. Now, a year-and-a-half on, it’s a six-time Oscar nominee and perhaps the most hard-fought of all of this year’s crop of Best Picture candidates. Joe Utichi meets Marder and stars Riz Ahmed and Paul Raci to take stock of a film that transformed its key players in ways they hadn’t expected.

EXCLUSIVE: Following its Oscar nomination, Elvira Lind’s short film The Letter Room has been racking up the sales. The movie, which stars Oscar Isaac and Alia Shawkat, has sold to France and Germany (ARTE France), Spain (Telefonica), Denmark (TV2), Russia (Shot TV), Poland (New Europe Film Sales), Airlines (JetBlue) as well as an international deal with Kanopy for the educational circuit.

Despite previous outrage that streaming service Netflix could have films nominated for Oscar Awards, this year the site has proven once again that its movies can play with the big boys.

Also Read: 'Godzilla vs Kong' Adds $13.3 Million in 2nd Weekend at Box OfficeThe “Gundam” brand itself has spun off into 14 TV series in addition to many home video films, manga comics and video games.

The Oscar-nominated filmmaking team behind the documentary Time are looking forward to a reunion at Union Station in Los Angeles, the main venue for this year’s Academy Awards. Director-producer Garrett Bradley and producers Lauren Domino and Kellen Quinn haven’t seen each other in person for a while, because of Covid-19.

In the Oscar-nominated documentary short A Concerto Is a Conversation, acclaimed composer Kris Bowers traces a line from his family history to the premiere performance of his original concerto "For a Younger Self" at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2019. Following that line is Horace Bowers Jr., Kris Bowers' 91-year-old grandfather, who sits down with his grandson to tell the story of his journey out of the Jim Crow-era South in the pursuit of his American Dream.

Dead children, democracy being crushed, senseless Nazi atrocities —there's not much happiness in this year's collection of Oscar-nominated short documentaries, unless you count the man who actually survived racism and homelessness to become a proud, successful grandpa. Each of these long "shorts" finds protagonists to root for; some contain seeds of hope; all boast polish and relevance that make them awards-ready.

Peter Debruge Chief Film CriticThose who typically scope the Academy Award-nominated shorts programs hoping to win the Oscar pool will have a particularly tough time of it with this year’s animated roster, as the options are wide-ranging but lack a clear frontrunner. A few of the talents have ties to Pixar, though only one short was actually developed at a studio, while the other four are far more personal, independent expressions with little in common, least of all technique.

A couple of truly daring visions spice up the expected fare in this year's crop of Academy-honored animated shorts — one of which would be as at home in an art gallery as in the theaters, which, pandemic be damned, will still showcase nominees as a big-screen event. Each candidate has something to offer, including those non-nominees that have been added (as "highly recommended") to stretch the program's running time to feature length.

Also Read: Jake Gyllenhaal, Julianne Moore, Isabela Merced Join Cast of 'Spirit Untamed' Animation“Across mediums and genres, our studio has fused art, craft, and technology in service of bold, distinctive, and enduring stories. With ‘Seventeen,’ Laika is taking that philosophy in an exciting new direction,” Knight said in a statement.

EXCLUSIVE: After a year of virtual festivals and Zoom-centric events, the Austin Film Festival & Writers Conference is ready to bring things into the new normal this fall with an in-person festival — one of the first since the pandemic. The eight-day festival is now set to take place October 21–28 in Austin, Texas.

Keanu Reeves has two new projects in the works — and they're both based on his comic book,.

Keanu Reeves is bringing his debut comic to Netflix!

Angelique Jackson Introducing the “Brzrkr” on-screen universe.“Brzrkr” co-author and co-creator Keanu Reeves will star in and produce both a live-action film and anime series adaptation of his BOOM! Studios comic series for Netflix.The new projects will be an expansion on the 12-episode limited series, which originated from an idea Reeves had been developing for a number of years.The legendary action star makes his comic book debut with the series, written with New York Times bestselling writer

Andra Day — correction: Best Actress nominee Andra Day — couldn’t be more excited. ET spoke with the star following news of her Oscar nomination Monday to get the details on how she first learned she was nominated and what this recognition means to her. “When I looked at my phone I saw that it was full of messages,” she shared about first realizing she was nominated.

That’s something we really need now, when so many countries are dealing with manipulative, corrupt and incompetent politicians.”Also Read: 'Collective' Named Top Documentary at Cinema Eye Honors“Collective” follows a team of Romanian journalists in the aftermath of a 2015 nightclub fire that killed 27 people.