Award Tour

Every year, you do the same thing: You sit down to watch the Academy Awards, and you realize about 15 minutes into it that you have not seen a third of these films. Shoot, you’ve never even heard of most of them, you terrible, awful, poor-excuse-for-a-film-nerd you. Just pray that “best movie” comes sooner than expected, so at least you can feign competence by claiming that No Country for Old Men will beat out There Will Be Blood. (Sorry, it’s not going to happen.)

But listen, dude; it doesn’t have to go down like that. Now’s the perfect time to brush up on your Oscar knowledge, and you can knock out two whole categories in one night if you visit the Academy Award Nominated Shorts Screening at Cinema Paradiso (503 SE Sixth St., Fort Lauderdale). In about an hour-and-a-half each, you can check out all the films nominated for in the live action shorts category and the animated shorts category, which is really badass, because (let’s face it) you never get to see these pieces. Notable flicks on the animated docket are Aleksandr Petrov’s Moya lyubov (My Love), about an oil painting that comes to life and spins a yarn about a nineteenth century love triangle (Petrov has won before, and this one is favored); and Même les pigeons vont au paradis, which is like a sci-fi version of a Mitch Albom novel, but with pigeons. For live action, two-time nominee Anja Daelemans is back with her film, Tanghi argentini, but critics are expecting a win out of The Tonto Woman, an adaptation of an Elmore Leonard story. The series has multiple showings Friday through Sunday. For a complete list, or to get tickets ($8 each) visit www.fliff.com.
Fri., Feb. 15; Sat., Feb. 16; Sun., Feb. 17, 2008