POLISH SHORTS ON THE ROAD TO THE ACADEMY AWARDS
On January 24, the nominations for the Academy Awards will be announced, and earlier the Oscar shortlists will appear. This year, Polish short films once again have a chance to be included on these lists and compete for the most important statuette in the world of cinema.
Last year, as many as five shorts won festivals which enable them to apply for an Academy Award. Still in 2015, the short documentary film "The End of the World" by Monika Pawluczuk won the qualifying award at the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival in the USA. Also the short documentary film "Invisible" by Zofia Pręgowska won qualifying award in 2015, at New Orleans Film Festival. Krakow Film Festival gave the chance for the Academy Award to the documentary film "Close Ties" by Zofia Kowalewska, and the victory at Rhode Island International Film Festival allowed the short feature film by Daria Woszek, "The Dogcatcher," to apply for the nomination. "The Tenants" by Klara Kochańska already has one Academy Award - the Bronze Medal of the Student Academy Awards and the award at Warsaw Film Festival made it possible for the film to compete for the most important award for short film.
In recent years, the Academy appreciated Polish productions. In 2014, two short documentary films: "Our Curse" by Tomasz Śliwiński and "Joanna" by Aneta Kopacz were nominated for the Academy Awards. Last year, "Super Unit" by Teresa Czepiec and "Starting Point" by Michał Szcześniak, which was eventually included on the shortlist, had a chance for a nomination. Earlier on, in the short documentary film category, the films "The Children of Leningradsky" by Hanna Polak and Andrzej Celiński (2005) and "Rabbit a la Berlin" by Bartosz Konopka and Piotr Rosołowski (2010) won the nominations.
We keep our fingers crossed so that this year the words "And the Oscar goes to ..." would be addressed to one of the Polish films.