2022 Animated Short Films. A Review

The Oscar nominated animated short films currently playing at the Michigan Theater run the gambit between the heartwarming to darkly disturbing and between the delightful to the tirelessly, try-hard, and pretentious.

The only one that is suitable for children first and foremost is easily the best. Robin Robin is about a family of field mice who adopt a robin after the egg falls from its nest and right next to their home. The main character learns how to identify as a bird in a mouse family. It ends with Robin’s family, and a newfound magpie bird friend, teaming up to square off with a cat in a memorably quirky fight with a fiendish cat.

Only one word is ever said in the Russian-made Box Ballet. This film tells the story of how an up and coming ballet dancer and an aging professional boxer. The story flip flops between their furtive and quietly sweet love affair and the brutal realities of real world abuse in both of their professions. Without giving away how it ends, let's just say it ends with a revolution starting on TV, depicting the major historical events for Russia that led to the last era of Russian history, that lasted until Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24.

There is no dialogue at all in Bestia. This quietly odd film from Chile might seem boring at first, but keep watching. The woman that the film is following may seem to be living a boring, solitary life; but the story unfolds like layers of an onion with more and more unsettling as the film makers reveal more details about where she goes and what she does every day. It is especially poignant if you know anything about Chile’s history of military dictatorship.

The main character narrates Affairs of the Heart in a breathless fashion. This brutally honest character study on growing up, family, rekindling lost ambition and the oddities of human behavior doesn’t care about who might be offended or uncomfortable because of it, and it definitely is not for children. While it could have been edited more than it was, it does come across as an ultimately charming film in the end, especially with its animation style, which is reminiscent of Ed, Edd n Eddy. It might ask big questions and abruptly try to end by answering them a bit matter-of-factly; but it is hardly a film that most adults would regret watching, especially if you feel stuck and frustrated in life right now.

Least impressive is the Spanish short The Windscreen Wiper. The art style is super stylish and impressive, and the soundtrack is pretty good. But beyond that, there is not much to praise The Windscreen Wiper on. The film jumps around a bit aimlessly between beautifully recreated depictions of cities from around the world and a restaurant where a man looks up from the table he is sitting at and asks “What is love?” The film never really answers this question as it goes from couple to couple and provides quick clips from their love stories, but the film never more than the slightest generalizations on cliches from other love stories that have been told a lot better countless other times before. Its production values are impeccable; but as a whole it comes across as a film that is all form and forgot the function in a pretentiously hipstery way.

Image Credit: Michigan Theater Foundation