Pixar, Nick Park on Animated Shortlist

The shortlist in the animated shorts category contains a few big names, and lots of foreign shorts.

Another day, another Oscar shortlist.

This time it’s the animated-short category, where 10 contenders have been chosen out of a field of 37 qualifying shorts.  (That’s low, by the category’s usual standards.)

 

Pixar, which often competes in this category but hasn’t won since 2002, is represented once again by "Partly Cloudy," from director Peter Sohn.

The other major player in the category is Nick Park with "A Matter of Loaf and Death" (left), the latest Wallace & Gromit film. Park has previously won this award for "Creature Comforts," "Wallace & Gromit in The Wrong Trousers" and "Wallace & Gromit in A Close Shave," as well as winning the animated feature Oscar for "Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit."

In fact, the British director has five Oscar nominations in the past 18 years, and he’s never gone home from a ceremony empty-handed.  

The only time he lost came when he lost to himself in 1991: "Creature Comforts" beat out his other nominated short, "A Grand Day Out With Wallace & Gromit."

Trying to end Park’s perfect streak will be a collection of mostly foreign-made films.  

The full list, with directors:

“The Cat Piano,” Eddie White and Ari Gibson.

“French Roast,” Fabrice O. Joubert (right).

“Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty,” Nicky Phelan.

“The Kinematograph,” Tomek Baginski.

“The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte),” Javier Recio Gracia.

“Logorama,” Nicolas Schmerkin.

“A Matter of Loaf and Death,” Nick Park.

“Partly Cloudy,” Peter Sohn.

“Runaway,” Cordell Barker.

Members of the Academy’s short films and feature animation branch will screen the 10 shortlisted films and select the five nominees during events in Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco in mid-January.

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