Before we do anything here, I’d just like to post this video from Funny or Die comparing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button to another fine Oscar favorite:
Somebody should sue. Anyway, Forrest Gump 2: Old Dude Gets Young grabbed 11 whoops, 13 nominations for this year’s Oscars, beating out Slumdog Millionaire which garnered 10. Other best picture competitors include Frost/Nixon, Milk and The Reader. The acting nominations were a little surprising: Kate Winslet, who won Golden Globes for Revolutionary Road and The Reader, was nominated only for the latter, and in the best actress category rather than supporting; Clint Eastwood was snubbed in acting categories, as was Golden Globe winner Sally Hawkins. Perhaps the most heartwarming aspect of the nominations was the poor performance of The Dark Knight, skulking away into its batcave with 8 nominations, all technical except for Heath Ledger’s posthumous supporting actor nod.
After the jump: Best Animated Short Films!
I found four of the five little cartoons nominated for Best Animated Short Films, and while there’s a bit too much cutesy-cuteness going on, they’re all worth the 1-10 minutes of your time they take up. First, “Octapodi,” a French short that anthropomorphizes octopi, which I suppose is more accurate than Finding Nemo‘s creepy pan-fishy love-fest:
Next, it’s the Russian entry, “Lavatory Lovestory,” whose Russian title, “Ubornaya Istoriya,” isn’t quite as doofy. It features a bathroom attendant who finds love (the sign on the window at the end means “help wanted”).
Pixar’s entry is this cute little story of a magician’s rabbit, “Presto”:
“This Way Up” is a short but sweet tale of a bad day in the life of two undertakers:
Another French entry, “La Maison en Petits Cubes,” looks to be the most interesting, but I couldn’t find a video online: it’s a traditionally-drawn story of a man who keeps building his house higher as water rises around him. That’s, like, totally sci-fi!
