There's a bit of a short film Oscar kerfluffle going on right now, and seeing as I only have a few days left that I can talk about the Oscars before I enter the post-awards season zone, I'm gonna talk about it. Because darnit, it pisses me off.
A few weeks back Disney put Paperman, one of the five films up for the Oscar for Best Animated Short, up for free online. Seeing all the buzz that film was getting, the other nominees did the same.
But then Shorts International, which organizes theatrical screenings of Oscar-animated shorts (I've been to three this year), got all butthurt about moviemakers releasing things online that people were supposed to pay for. They demanded the moviemakers take the shorts down.
Up until this point I'm kind of/sort of somewhat sympathetic to Shorts International. They release this shorts program, presumably dealing with contracts and agreements with the filmmakers so they can do so, and then they turn around and the films are being offered for free. It affects their bottom line. It's a sucky thing.
But the rhetoric in the letter from Shorts International's Chief Executive Carter Pillcher asking the nominees to take their shorts offline just ticked me the hell off. In it, he says:
Can your sanctimonious BS, Pilcher. Outside of your series, which runs a few weeks a year, and scattered film festivals that most people don't or can't attend, short films don't get theatrical release. The fact that you're upset at being affected financially is valid, but your language here seems to imply, what, that these moviemakers aren't appreciating their films enough by putting them online? Heaven forbid filmmakers want their films to be seen by as many people as possible, and like it or not with short films the Internet is pretty much the only way that's going to happen.
Should they have waited until after the Oscars to upload to YouTube? Maybe. As Pilcher points out in the letter, the Academy voters have their own screeners, so having the films online shouldn't necessarily affect how the voting goes. But there's more interest in these shorts in the weeks before the Oscars, not after. More people will want to see all of them, not just the one that walked away with that statuette. It's, forgive the pun, a golden opportunity for the teams behind these shorts to get the films they've worked so hard on seen by a general populace that, generally speaking, doesn't watch short films unless they're… wait for it… on YouTube.
A few weeks back Disney put Paperman, one of the five films up for the Oscar for Best Animated Short, up for free online. Seeing all the buzz that film was getting, the other nominees did the same.
But then Shorts International, which organizes theatrical screenings of Oscar-animated shorts (I've been to three this year), got all butthurt about moviemakers releasing things online that people were supposed to pay for. They demanded the moviemakers take the shorts down.
Up until this point I'm kind of/sort of somewhat sympathetic to Shorts International. They release this shorts program, presumably dealing with contracts and agreements with the filmmakers so they can do so, and then they turn around and the films are being offered for free. It affects their bottom line. It's a sucky thing.
But the rhetoric in the letter from Shorts International's Chief Executive Carter Pillcher asking the nominees to take their shorts offline just ticked me the hell off. In it, he says:
Unlike Webbies or Ani's, the Academy Award is designed to award excellence in the making of motto pictures that receive a cinematic release, not an online release. Since 2006, we have built theater audience significantly and created widespread interest in the films themselves and their place in the movie theater. This release of the films on the Internet threatens to destroy 8 years of audience growth and the notion that these film gems are indeed movies—no feature length film would consider a free online release as a marketing tool!
Can your sanctimonious BS, Pilcher. Outside of your series, which runs a few weeks a year, and scattered film festivals that most people don't or can't attend, short films don't get theatrical release. The fact that you're upset at being affected financially is valid, but your language here seems to imply, what, that these moviemakers aren't appreciating their films enough by putting them online? Heaven forbid filmmakers want their films to be seen by as many people as possible, and like it or not with short films the Internet is pretty much the only way that's going to happen.
Should they have waited until after the Oscars to upload to YouTube? Maybe. As Pilcher points out in the letter, the Academy voters have their own screeners, so having the films online shouldn't necessarily affect how the voting goes. But there's more interest in these shorts in the weeks before the Oscars, not after. More people will want to see all of them, not just the one that walked away with that statuette. It's, forgive the pun, a golden opportunity for the teams behind these shorts to get the films they've worked so hard on seen by a general populace that, generally speaking, doesn't watch short films unless they're… wait for it… on YouTube.
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