'Amy,' 'Where to Invade Next' Among 15 Documentaries on Oscars Shortlist
By Gregg Kilday
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has selected fifteen feature documentaries that will go on to compete for the Academy Award.
In a highly competitive year for documentary films — 124 films were submitted — the preliminary round of voting by members of the Academy’s documentary branch singled out films that range from Asif Kapadia’s Amy, a look at the late singer Amy Winehouse, to Evgeny Afineevsky’s Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom, which takes viewers behind the lines of the Ukranian uprising in 2013-2014.
A number of past Oscar winners are represented by new works on the list: Michael Moore, a winner for 2002’s Bowling for Columbine, is back with Where to Invade Next, in which he journeys to Europe to spotlight progressive policies lacking in America; Alex Gibney, who took home the Oscar for 2007’s Taxi to the Dark Side, made the list for Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief; Davis Guggenheim, who received an Oscar for 2006’s An Inconvenient Truth, has directed He Named Me Malala, about the young activist Malala Yousafzai; and Morgan Neville, who earned his Oscar for 2013’s 20 Feet From Stardom, is repped by Best of Enemies, a film about Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley, which Neville directed with Robert Gordon.
The eclectic group of choices also includes Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Look of Silence, which returns to the subject of Cambodian genocide, which was also the subject of his Oscar-nominated 2012 film The Act of Killing; Kirby Dick’s The Hunting Ground, an expose of sexual assault on American campuses that has become part of the national debate; Heart of a Dog, a cinematic essay by musician Laurie Anderson; Stevan Riley’s Listen to Me Marlon, which features audiotapes recorded by the late actor Marlon Brando; and Meru, which recounts to attempts to scale the Himilayan peak of the title and was directed by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi.
The shortlist also encompasses Liz Garbus’ What Happened, Miss Simone?, which looks at the life and times of singer Nina Simone; Matthew Heineman’s Cartel Land, which captures efforts to fight the drug cartels along the U.S./Mexican border; Marc Silver’s 3 ½ Minutes, 10 Bullets, which focuses on the murder of a young black man in Jacksonville, Florida; and Hubert Sauper’s We Come as Friends, a tour of war-ravaged South Sudan.
The complete list of films follows:
Amy, On the Corner Films and Universal Music
Best of Enemies, Sandbar
Cartel Land, Our Time Projects and The Documentary Group
Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief, Jigsaw Productions
He Named Me Malala, Parkes-MacDonald and Little Room
Heart of a Dog, Canal Street Communications
The Hunting Ground, Chain Camera Pictures
Listen to Me Marlon, Passion Pictures
The Look of Silence, Final Cut for Real
Meru, Little Monster Films
3 ½ Minutes, 10 Bullets, The Filmmaker Fund, Motto Pictures, Lakehouse Films, Actual Films, JustFilms, MacArthur Foundation and Bertha BRITDOC
We Come as Friends, Adelante Films
What Happened, Miss Simone?, RadicalMedia and Moxie Firecracker
Where to Invade Next, Dog Eat Dog Productions
Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom, Pray for Ukraine Productions
