Oscars: Five Swiss short films in the running
No less than five Swiss filmmakers have qualified to submit their short films in the hopes of an Academy Award as a result of winning a festival award this year.
01.10.2014
A short film is eligible for a nomination by winning a prestigious festival award (cf. List of Oscar festivals). Oscars are awarded in three different categories in the short genre. Qualifying for a nomination in the category of Best Documentary - Short Subject are Oliver Schwarz's Dream Girl and Marie-Elsa Sgualdo's You Can't Do Everything At Once, But You Can Leave Everything At Once. Michael Frei's Plug & Play and Gerd Gockell's Patch are in the running for a nomination in the category of Best Animated Short Film. The French short film Totems by the Italian-Swiss director Sarah Arnold was honoured with the main prize in the Pardi di domani - Concorso nazionale section in Locarno and is up for a nomination in the Best Live Action Short Film category.
Reto Caffi's On the Line was the last Swiss short film to be nominated for an Oscar. In 2009 it was among the five films competing in the category of Live Action Short Film. One year prior to that he had already been honoured with the Student Oscar for Best Foreign Film (Honorary Foreign Film Award). Last year two Swiss short film productions from film schools were also honoured with prizes at the Student Academy Awards 2013: A World For Raúl by Mauro Mueller (Bronze Medal - Narrative Category) and Parvaneh by Talkhon Hamzavi (Silver Medal - Foreign Category).
In recent years two or three short films from Switzerland have qualified for the Oscar shortlist each time due to a festival award. The number this year is exceptionally high. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Hollywood will announce the Oscar nominations mid-January 2015. The Oscars will be awarded in Los Angeles on February 22, 2015.
SWISS FILMS, October 1, 2014