Best Oscar Nominated
"Just Before Losing Everything" (French title: Avant que de tout perdre) is a 2013 French short drama film written and directed by Xavier Legrand. The film depicts a woman and her two children attempting to flee from her abusive husband and father. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Liv...
The Tell-Tale Heart is a 1953 animated short film adapted from Edgar Allan Poe's story of the same name. Produced by United Productions of America, it translates Poe's first-person tale of fear, guilt, and psychological breakdown into a stylized animated form. The film was nominated for the Academy...
4.1 Miles is a 2016 documentary short film directed by Daphne Matziaraki. It follows the Greek coast guard's rescue work during the European migrant crisis, focusing on the practical and human consequences of maritime crossings near Greece. The title refers to the short sea distance involved in the...
In the Absence is a 2018 South Korean and American documentary short directed by Yi Seung-jun. It examines the 2014 sinking of the MV Sewol, in which more than 300 people died, most of them students, and follows the consequences for survivors' families and public demands for accountability. The film...
Ten Meter Tower, or Hopptornet, is a 2016 Swedish documentary short directed by Axel Danielson and Maximilien Van Aertryck. The film observes people who have never stood on a ten-meter diving tower as they decide whether to jump or climb down, turning a simple physical challenge into a study of hesi...
Our Curse is a 2013 Polish short documentary film directed by Tomasz Śliwiński. The film chronicles the personal experiences of the director and his wife, Magda, as they care for their newborn son, who is diagnosed with Ondine's curse, a rare respiratory disorder. By documenting the family's daily s...
"Dcera" ("Daughter") is a 2019 Czech stop-motion animated short film written and directed by Daria Kashcheeva. The film explores a complex, strained relationship between a daughter and her father, unfolding largely in a hospital room. It is distinguished by its raw, expressive animation style, utili...
Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó is a 2023 American documentary short film directed by Sean Wang. It portrays Wang's two grandmothers, who live together and share their daily routines, humor, affection, and reflections on aging. The film presents an intimate family portrait shaped by the director's relationship wit...
Joanna is a Polish documentary short directed by Aneta Kopacz. It follows Joanna Salyga, a young mother with cancer, as she spends time with her husband and young son while confronting a limited prognosis. The film focuses on family life, illness, and the ordinary activities that structure their rem...
Extremis is a 2016 American documentary short directed by Dan Krauss. Filmed with access to an intensive care unit, it examines decisions involving doctors, patients, and families when illness reaches an end-of-life stage, including the intersection of medical judgment, faith, and personal values. T...
Walk Run Cha-Cha is a 2019 American documentary short directed and written by Laura Nix. It follows Chipaul and Millie Cao, a Vietnamese couple who were separated by the Vietnam War and later reunited in Southern California, where they take ballroom-dance lessons. The film connects their dance pract...
Edith+Eddie is a 2017 American documentary short directed by Laura Checkoway. It follows Edith Hill and Eddie Harrison, an interracial couple in their nineties whose marriage is affected by family conflict, separation, and questions involving elder care and guardianship. The film began as a portrait...
Joe's Violin is a 2016 American documentary short directed and produced by Kahane Cooperman. It follows Joe Feingold, a Polish Holocaust survivor who donates his violin through an instrument drive, and Brianna Perez, a 12-year-old student from the Bronx who receives it. The film connects the instrum...
"Lost & Found" is a British animated short film directed by Philip Hunt and released in 2008. Produced by Studio AKA, the film is a faithful adaptation of Oliver Jeffers' award-winning children's picture book of the same name. It tells the story of a young boy who discovers a penguin on his doorstep...
Der Schneemann is a German animated short associated with director and animator Hans Fischerkoesen. Film records identify it as a 13-minute production released in 1944, with an idea credited to Horst von Möllendorff. The film follows a snowman who wants to experience summer and is often discussed in...
End Game is a 2018 American documentary short directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. Set in hospitals and hospice-related care, it follows patients, families, and clinicians confronting terminal illness and death, focusing on palliative medicine, end-of-life decisions, and the effort to prese...
Ennemis Intérieurs is a 2016 French live-action short film written and directed by Sélim Azzazi. Set against the political tensions surrounding the Algerian War, it centers on an interrogation between a police investigator and an Algerian immigrant in France, using their encounter to examine identit...
St. Louis Superman is a 2019 American documentary short directed by Smriti Mundhra and Sami Khan. It follows Bruce Franks Jr., a community activist and battle rapper from St. Louis who enters Missouri politics and works on issues affecting his district. The film was nominated for the Academy Award f...
Heroin(e) is a 2017 American documentary short directed by Elaine McMillion Sheldon. Filmed in Huntington, West Virginia, it follows three women whose professional and community work brings them into contact with the local opioid crisis. The film was shortlisted for the 2018 Academy Awards and nomin...
Facing Fear is a 2013 American documentary short directed by Jason Cohen. It recounts the later meeting and relationship between Matthew Boger, who survived a hate crime, and Tim Zaal, a former neo-Nazi skinhead involved in the attack. The film examines the subjects' movement from violence and preju...
Monrovia, Indiana is a 2018 American documentary feature directed, edited, and co-produced by Frederick Wiseman. The film observes daily life in the small farming community of Monrovia, Indiana, including public meetings, religious activity, work, and local social events. Its observational approach...
Knife Skills is a 2017 American documentary short directed by Thomas Lennon. It follows the opening and early operation of EDWINS Leadership & Restaurant Institute in Cleveland, Ohio, a program that trains formerly incarcerated people for careers in the culinary and hospitality industries. The film...
Body Team 12 is a 2015 documentary short film directed by David Darg about a Liberian Red Cross team assigned to collect the bodies of people who died during the Ebola epidemic in Liberia. The film follows the workers in communities affected by the outbreak and presents the physical danger, emotiona...
Traffic Stop is a 2017 American documentary short directed by Kate Davis and David Heilbroner. It uses dashboard-camera footage and interviews to examine a traffic stop involving Breaion King, a Black schoolteacher in Austin, Texas, whose encounter with police became the film's central subject. The...
"Whale Valley" is a 2013 Icelandic live-action short film written and directed by Guðmundur Arnar Guðmundsson. The narrative centers on the complex emotional dynamics between two brothers growing up in a remote fishing community in rural Iceland. It explores themes of masculinity, brotherly love, an...
"Your Face" is a 1987 animated short film created by American animator Bill Plympton. The film is distinguished by its surreal, constantly morphing depiction of a seated man singing while his facial features distort into a variety of bizarre, impossible shapes and objects. It is widely regarded as a...
The Voorman Problem is a 2012 British live-action short film directed by Mark Gill. The dark comedy stars Martin Freeman as a prison doctor who is summoned to evaluate an inmate claiming to be a god from a fictional country. The film is adapted from a segment of David Mitchell’s novel number9dream....
Jim Danforth is an American stop-motion animator and visual effects artist known for his work in fantasy and science fiction cinema. He is particularly recognized for his animation and special visual effects on the 1970 Hammer Film production When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth, which earned an Academy A...
That Wasn't Me is a 2012 Spanish live-action short film written and directed by Esteban Crespo. The drama follows a Spanish aid worker whose encounter with armed child soldiers in Africa develops into an account of violence, survival, and lasting trauma. It received a nomination for the Academy Awar...
The Snail and the Whale is a 2019 British animated television short produced by Magic Light Pictures. It adapts the picture book written by Julia Donaldson and illustrated by Axel Scheffler, following a small sea snail that travels around the world on the tail of a humpback whale. The film uses comp...
