Oscar Short Films 2015

This was supposed to have about 13 entries, since my On Demand promised all the Oscar-nominated shorts in one location.  Lies.  They had all the Live Action shorts and 3/5 of the Animated.  Total ripoff.  Still, I suppose it's better than the paltry two I managed to see on my own.

Nominated for Best Live Action Short

Ave Maria (2015) 
This was a super cute, funny short about a Jewish family trying to get home for Shabbat who crash into the statue of the Virgin outside a nunnery in Palestine.  The nuns are under a vow of silence, the Jews are under their own religious mandate, and all parties realize that sometimes rules have to be broken for everyone to get what they want.

Shok (Friend) (2015)
  This was not funny.  This was very sad and based on true events, which is much worse.  A man sees a bike on the road and remembers his childhood in Kosovo just before the civil war, specifically about him and his best friend trying to navigate their way around partisan soldiers.

Alles Wird Gut (Everything Will Be Okay) (2015)
  Ugh, everything is not okay.  Parents, please don't kidnap your own children.  It's fucked up.  A divorced man picks up his daughter for his scheduled weekend, then attempts to get her to leave the country with him.  She's young but she's smart enough to know when something is wrong.  This is one of those movies where you just feel awful for every character.

Stutterer (2015)
  Now we're back to something adorable.  A man is trying to overcome a lifetime of nervousness in order to meet his online girlfriend.  He has a severe stutter and face-to-face interactions are frustrating and embarrassing, especially because his inner monologue is clever and witty.  This was super cute and very relatable for all the shy people out there, myself included.  I can't tell you how many times I've wished I could have pretended to be deaf so people wouldn't try to talk to me.  And I don't have a speech impediment.  Also, the lead actor in this is super hot.

Day One (2015)
  An interpreter for the U.S. Army starts her first day in Afghanistan with a roadside bomb, an arrest, and a breech birth.  Okay, I was an Army interpreter and I have to tell you, even in a war zone, I did not deal with any of that shit.  Except for the bombing but that's an everybody problem, not an interpreter problem.  I mostly had really positive experiences but if my first day on the job was like this one, I would have reconsidered my life choices.

Nominated for Best Animated Short

Historia de un oso (Bear Story) (2014)
  I don't even know why depressing animation exists.  What the fuck.  A bear tells the story of his life and how he was kidnapped, sold to a circus, and forced to do humiliating tricks when all he wanted was to escape and return to his family.

Prologue (2015)
  This was only six minutes long but the animation on display was stunning. It's a completely wordless skirmish between a pair of Athenian warriors and a pair of Spartans.