Oscar Doc Shortlist Serious & Issue-Oriented, as Always

List of 8 contenders includes docs on suicide bombings, campus shootings and Robert Kennedy

Eight documentary shorts have made the shortlist for the 2010 Oscars, the Academy announced on Wednesday.

Killing in the NameAs usual, the shortlisted films are long on serious, issue-oriented documentaries, which dominate this category almost to the exclusion of every other kind of short documentary.

The films include "Killing in the Name," which focuses on the victims of two terrorist suicide bombings; "Born Sweet," about poison in the water supply in Cambodia; and "Living for 32," about a survivor of the 2007 Virginia Tech campus shootings.

The list, with production companies:

“Born Sweet,” Cynthia Wade Productions
“Killing in the Name,” Moxie Firecracker Films (photo above)
“Living for 32,” Cuomo Cole Productions
“One Thousand Pictures: RFK’s Last Journey,” Lichen Films
“Poster Girl,” Portrayal Films
“Strangers No More,” Simon & Goodman Picture Company
“Sun Come Up,” Sun Come Up, LLC
“The Warriors of Qiugang,” Thomas Lennon Films, Inc.

The shortlisted films will now be viewed and scored by special committees from the documentary branch of the Academy, and a final slate of three-to-five nominees will be announced on Tuesday, January 25.

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