OVP: Best Documentary Short Film (2014)
The Nominees Were...
Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry, Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1
Anete Kopacz, Joanna
Tomasz Sliwinksi and Maciej Slesicki, Our Curse
Gabriel Serra Arguello, The Reaper (La Parka)
J. Christian Jensen, White Earth
My Thoughts: When I originally conceived of the OVP a few years back, I didn't really think that the short films would be much of an option, as most of them have been lost through the years, but I did make a pact with myself if, in my filmic course, I did stumble across a full category (likely through watching all of the films in the theater with my beloved ShortsHD screenings) that I would do OVP write-ups. 2014, as it turns out, is the first year ever that I've completed for the Documentary Short category (click the Short Films tag below for some past years of Live Action and Animated Shorts), so I will officially be able to mark this off the list. So while this isn't part of my "official" OVP project (which doesn't include the Shorts and Documentaries for reasons listed here), it's still a slate of Oscar-nominated films and because it's not technically part of the OVP, I'm going to give it a little early before we even start the 2014 rundown!
We'll go in the order that ShortsHD aired the films, so I'll start with Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1, which is a portrait of a crisis hotline that deals with suicidal veterans. The film, which has the feel of something from television (it is produced by HBO) is certainly riveting-each phone call we get the sense of the impact of war, and we're left on the edge of our seat over whether or not the caller on the other line will end up dying (it's worth noting that no soldier actually dies on the other end of the call). The film is extremely noble in its attempts to shine a light on the way that our country shows so little support for our veterans, particularly in terms of dealing with PTSD and the mental anguish of war (this is the only such crisis center in the country), but the film itself is not what I'd consider particularly good. The film feels a bit too self-congratulatory (we're doing this and you aren't), and the structure of the film occasionally feels tacky-we're watching the most personal moments of these people's lives, shouldn't they be able to find a way to frame this without seeming like such a gross invasion of privacy? I left this film feeling like the first pancake-good, but clearly something better will come along.
Next we had Joanna, the other extremely long entry (when I go to the Live Action Shorts each year, my friend Liz always gets fidgety around the fourth film when she realizes exactly how long they still are going to be). Clocking in at 40 minutes, Joanna is one of two Polish films nominated this year, and is the story of a woman dying of cancer. Or at least that's what we learn as the film unfolds-the movie is really about the ways that she spends her final days, partaking in mundane tasks with her child as she slowly tries to impart rudimentary wisdom on a person that she loves but whose life she won't get to see. It's extremely well-framed, and the conversations between the son and mother are exceptional, though because the film doesn't employ talking head-style conversations we frequently feel like strangers in this household, and like Crisis Hotline (but more intensely) I felt deeply uncomfortable with the way we intrude on this family's lives-the film is told in such a cinematic way that it really doesn't feel like a documentary, but a narrative film, and while that's a cool concept, it occasionally took me out of the reality of this picture.
Third up is White Earth, a film that seemed to be a crowd favorite with my audience, principally because the film is about the oil fields in North Dakota, which is just to our left here in Minnesota, so the jokes about winter and snow all landed with gusto (Midwesterners love nothing more than to talk about the weather). The actual film seems pale in comparison to The Overnighters, a film on the same subject that received much press this past year (it's kind of strange how much press in general the "land that law forgot" world of Williston and the rest of the North Dakota oil boom towns has received in the past year nationally), and frequently meanders. It doesn't want to take a strong stance for or against the quick expansion of the oil towns, in my opinion, but instead just shows that it might be a necessary evil. The movie itself is certainly the most traditional of all of the documentaries, relying heavily on visual imagery (North Dakota is such a flat state that an oil rig will stand out for miles) and a few alternating narratives. All-in-all, this felt the least impactful and the most underdeveloped of the films, particularly considering it was treading relatively new ground (it's not yet another documentary about cancer) and could have therefore been the most special.
The Reaper was clearly the film that the audience in my theater hated (it was notably the only one of the five films that didn't get a round of applause afterwards). It's not hard to see why-in a state very reliant on cattle and farming, a movie showing the morality and the "how sausage is made" aspect of the meat industry is going to be seen with skepticism. This is a pity, because cinematically this is the most impressive even if the message is sometimes obscured by the off-putting shots of cows being slaughtered. The film slowly unfolds its story not just as an in-depth look at what a meat-packing plant does, but also on the man who has worked for decades as the guy who pulls the lever, killing thousands upon thousands of cows in his lifetime. He talks about the reasons he does this (his children have to eat), but clearly the bizarre aspect of killing so many creatures weighs heavily upon him after all of these years. It's a truly interesting film that doesn't have the obvious human weight of a cancer or military suicide hotline, but makes you uncomfortable in the right way-it's the only film that I left trying to figure out my feelings on the subject, which is always a good thing for a documentary. They're supposed to make you think.
The final film was just as hard to watch, though unlike Crisis Hotline and Joanna, Our Curse doesn't feel quite as inappropriately voyeuristic since the film's director is in fact the subject (for those who have seen the film, it's the father that is nominated). It's also a very personal subject about the unfairness of existence, as we see a man and a woman who clearly have lost any zeal for life in the film's opening moments, and then we realize why-they have a child with a rare respiratory disorder that requires him to be on a machine every night while he sleeps so that he doesn't die. The film hits familiar notes with such a subject (the questions about his future, the reality that a disease like this likely ends in defeat, the financial and time impact on such a couple), but it does it in a way not often seen: we actually have to sit through what the couple does every day in several scenes. In perhaps the most uncomfortable scene in any of these five very dour movies (even by Academy standards, this is a depressing bunch of films), we have to watch as they struggle to quickly change the tube in their child's neck while he struggles to breath and wheezes instead of crying. It's heartbreaking stuff (it's always a good idea to bring Kleenex to the short films as they are heavy on the tears, and this is definitely the part where most of the audience was dabbing their eyes), but it's also very effective. You leave wondering how you would handle such a situation, and the thoughts of resentment toward the baby make you question your own sense of universal love.
We'll go in the order that ShortsHD aired the films, so I'll start with Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1, which is a portrait of a crisis hotline that deals with suicidal veterans. The film, which has the feel of something from television (it is produced by HBO) is certainly riveting-each phone call we get the sense of the impact of war, and we're left on the edge of our seat over whether or not the caller on the other line will end up dying (it's worth noting that no soldier actually dies on the other end of the call). The film is extremely noble in its attempts to shine a light on the way that our country shows so little support for our veterans, particularly in terms of dealing with PTSD and the mental anguish of war (this is the only such crisis center in the country), but the film itself is not what I'd consider particularly good. The film feels a bit too self-congratulatory (we're doing this and you aren't), and the structure of the film occasionally feels tacky-we're watching the most personal moments of these people's lives, shouldn't they be able to find a way to frame this without seeming like such a gross invasion of privacy? I left this film feeling like the first pancake-good, but clearly something better will come along.
Next we had Joanna, the other extremely long entry (when I go to the Live Action Shorts each year, my friend Liz always gets fidgety around the fourth film when she realizes exactly how long they still are going to be). Clocking in at 40 minutes, Joanna is one of two Polish films nominated this year, and is the story of a woman dying of cancer. Or at least that's what we learn as the film unfolds-the movie is really about the ways that she spends her final days, partaking in mundane tasks with her child as she slowly tries to impart rudimentary wisdom on a person that she loves but whose life she won't get to see. It's extremely well-framed, and the conversations between the son and mother are exceptional, though because the film doesn't employ talking head-style conversations we frequently feel like strangers in this household, and like Crisis Hotline (but more intensely) I felt deeply uncomfortable with the way we intrude on this family's lives-the film is told in such a cinematic way that it really doesn't feel like a documentary, but a narrative film, and while that's a cool concept, it occasionally took me out of the reality of this picture.
Third up is White Earth, a film that seemed to be a crowd favorite with my audience, principally because the film is about the oil fields in North Dakota, which is just to our left here in Minnesota, so the jokes about winter and snow all landed with gusto (Midwesterners love nothing more than to talk about the weather). The actual film seems pale in comparison to The Overnighters, a film on the same subject that received much press this past year (it's kind of strange how much press in general the "land that law forgot" world of Williston and the rest of the North Dakota oil boom towns has received in the past year nationally), and frequently meanders. It doesn't want to take a strong stance for or against the quick expansion of the oil towns, in my opinion, but instead just shows that it might be a necessary evil. The movie itself is certainly the most traditional of all of the documentaries, relying heavily on visual imagery (North Dakota is such a flat state that an oil rig will stand out for miles) and a few alternating narratives. All-in-all, this felt the least impactful and the most underdeveloped of the films, particularly considering it was treading relatively new ground (it's not yet another documentary about cancer) and could have therefore been the most special.
The Reaper was clearly the film that the audience in my theater hated (it was notably the only one of the five films that didn't get a round of applause afterwards). It's not hard to see why-in a state very reliant on cattle and farming, a movie showing the morality and the "how sausage is made" aspect of the meat industry is going to be seen with skepticism. This is a pity, because cinematically this is the most impressive even if the message is sometimes obscured by the off-putting shots of cows being slaughtered. The film slowly unfolds its story not just as an in-depth look at what a meat-packing plant does, but also on the man who has worked for decades as the guy who pulls the lever, killing thousands upon thousands of cows in his lifetime. He talks about the reasons he does this (his children have to eat), but clearly the bizarre aspect of killing so many creatures weighs heavily upon him after all of these years. It's a truly interesting film that doesn't have the obvious human weight of a cancer or military suicide hotline, but makes you uncomfortable in the right way-it's the only film that I left trying to figure out my feelings on the subject, which is always a good thing for a documentary. They're supposed to make you think.
The final film was just as hard to watch, though unlike Crisis Hotline and Joanna, Our Curse doesn't feel quite as inappropriately voyeuristic since the film's director is in fact the subject (for those who have seen the film, it's the father that is nominated). It's also a very personal subject about the unfairness of existence, as we see a man and a woman who clearly have lost any zeal for life in the film's opening moments, and then we realize why-they have a child with a rare respiratory disorder that requires him to be on a machine every night while he sleeps so that he doesn't die. The film hits familiar notes with such a subject (the questions about his future, the reality that a disease like this likely ends in defeat, the financial and time impact on such a couple), but it does it in a way not often seen: we actually have to sit through what the couple does every day in several scenes. In perhaps the most uncomfortable scene in any of these five very dour movies (even by Academy standards, this is a depressing bunch of films), we have to watch as they struggle to quickly change the tube in their child's neck while he struggles to breath and wheezes instead of crying. It's heartbreaking stuff (it's always a good idea to bring Kleenex to the short films as they are heavy on the tears, and this is definitely the part where most of the audience was dabbing their eyes), but it's also very effective. You leave wondering how you would handle such a situation, and the thoughts of resentment toward the baby make you question your own sense of universal love.
Other Precursor Contenders: The Academy releases a shortlist of the films eligible for this award (quite cruelly, there are only eight films on the list, and so you know you lost an Oscar nomination with a 62.5% shot at the prize), so One Child, Kehinde Wiley: An Economy of Grace, and The Lion's Mouth Opens were just a few votes away from being Oscar-nominated.
Films I Would Have Nominated: Sadly they don't put short films before films with regularity anymore (don't you wish they did?) and so I don't get to see enough nominees to complain.
Oscar’s Choice: I would imagine that this is going to be between Joanna and Crisis Hotline, both of which are fairly long and incredibly emotional pieces of work, and feel like they're in Oscar's wheelhouse.
My Choice: I'm probably going to go with The Reaper, which felt the most self-assured and provocative. I didn't really "feel" any of the other ones in quite the same way, so I'll follow with Joanna, Our Curse, Crisis Hotline, and White Earth at the rear.
Those are my thoughts-what are yours? Did you see these documentary films, and if so, who were you cheering for?
Also in 2014:
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