News

Updated: Jan. 17, 2025

Predicting the nominees for the three short film categories at the Oscars is no easy task. Fortunately for you, we are here to help. Below are the 15 shortlisted titles for Best Live Action Short at the Academy Awards along with descriptions and embedded videos where available.

Among the subjects on this year’s list: an adolescent boy seeking to prove that he belongs in his family, the last moments that a woman spends in prison, a woman seeking to figure out whether she’s an android, and a Jewish ice cream shop owner in 1940s Amsterdam.

Here is your 2025 Oscars Best Live Action Short cheat sheet, ranked according to Gold Derby’s current combined odds:

“The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent” – 39/10 odds

In war-torn Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1993, a passenger train is stopped by paramilitary forces to conduct an ethnic cleansing operation and only one of the...

If you’ve never been homeless then it’s hard to imagine just how scary it is to be out on the streets at night with nowhere to go, no place to find refuge, but director Tj O’Grady Peyton does a good job of capturing that feeling in this Oscar-shortlisted short. It follows Isaac (Gabriel Adewusi) as he moves between hostels and agencies, desperately looking for somewhere with a free bed, only to come up empty handed. Then, in a late night café, he encounters Victoria (Brid Brennan), a widow who was recently lost her sight. Charged by the owner with following her to return the bag she has forgotten, he makes an impulsive decision, and secretly seeks shelter in her home.

It’s a tense situation, and one we would normally expect to see play out as a thriller. There is, indeed, tension throughout. Isaac is much bigger than Victoria,...

Room Taken

A homeless man with nowhere else to go surreptitiously takes refuge in the home of a blind stranger in Oscar-shortlisted short film Room Taken, but this is less the thriller that it might sound like and more a taste of something magical. Stars Gabriel Adewusi and Brid Brennan bring deep sensitivity to a story which flips stereotypes on their heads and finds strength and vulnerability in unexpected places.

Director Tj O’Grady Peyton was not available to talk about the film because he’s been in Los Angeles to organise a screening which, in the end, he had to ask people to stay away from because the wildfires made moving around the city too dangerous. Writer Michael Whelan and producer Colman Mac Cionnaith were able to meet, however, both understandably excited about the progress of their work.

It was influenced in large part by one of his family members,...

Doc Short Contenders Give Voters Plenty to Ponder

The 15 films that made the shortlist in the Oscars’ documentary short category are all powerful and thought-provoking, making the competition for an Academy Award nod incredibly stiff this year.

Leading the charge are “Incident,” “The Only Girl in the Orchestra,” “The Quilters,” “Death by Numbers” and “Keepers.”

The first 89 seconds of Bill Morrison’s police brutality doc “Incident” is silent. Security footage captures a street in Chicago on a July afternoon in 2018. Minutes later, a man is dead. Through a series of recordings of CCTV and police bodycam footage captured from different vantage points, Morrison offers a raw look at the Chicago police shooting of a Black man. The 29-minute New Yorker film won the best short documentary award at the 2023 IDA Documentary Awards and garnered a spot on the influential Doc NYC shortlist earlier this year.

Netflix’s “The Only Girl...

The 2025 Oscars shortlist was revealed Tuesday, and the Live Action Short Films category aims to pull on Academy voters’ heartstrings and appeal to their humanity.

With each showcasing and tackling a form of injustice, societal inequality and perseverance, highlights that found a place for themselves across the 15 dedicated slots include notable shorts such as Adam J. Graves’ Anuja, which follows the story of a young Indian girl who has to decide between education or employment at a factory. The short film grabbed wins for Best Live Action Short at the HollyShorts Film Festival, the Grand Prize at the New York International Short Film Festival alongside attaining support from filmmakers Mindy Kaling and Guneet Monga Kapoor, who signed on as EPs. Dovecote, directed by Marco Perego, stars Zoe Saldaña as a woman who contemplates the real meaning of freedom on her last day in prison.

In the Colin Farrell endorsed and EP’d project Room Taken,...

The plight of unhoused people and the growing epidemic of elderly loneliness and disability hardship are at the center of Tj O’Grady Peyton’s Room Taken. The short film, written by Michael Whelan and executive produced by Colin Farrell, centers on Isaac (Gabriel Adewusi), a newly arrived immigrant to Ireland from Nigeria who struggles to find a stable place to lay his head. He then comes across Victoria (Brid Brennan), a recently widowed elderly blind woman who lives alone and takes the opportunity to secretly stay at her home unnoticed as he awaits news of better accommodations.

In its 17-minute runtime, Room Taken navigates humanist themes such as the hardship faced by asylum seekers and the lack of proper services for the unhoused population in Ireland. It also includes themes of grief and isolation for elderly citizens as they suffer the loss of their partners or experience an onset of disability from aging.

“The Penguin” star Colin Farrell has boarded Irish short film “Room Taken” as an executive producer.

Tj O’Grady-Peyton directs the film about loneliness, grief and the immigrant experience from a screenplay by first timer Michael Whelan while Colmán Mac Cionnaith (“Supergirl”) produces.

Bríd Brennan (“Hope Street”) stars alongside newcomer Gabriel Adewusi.

“‘Room Taken’ follows Isaac, newly arrived in Ireland and looking for a place to stay, when he secretly moves into the home of Victoria, an elderly blind woman, leading them to form a unique bond,” reads the synopsis.

“Room Taken” has qualified for the Oscars longlist after winning best short at the 2024 Cleveland International Film Festival and a gold medal for best film at the Manhattan Short Film Festival.

“‘Room Taken’ is such a gentle cry to the power of human connection,” said Farrell. “It treats loneliness and grief and the struggle of the immigrant with such a gentle hand,...

The world premere of Irish director Ross Killeen’s Don’t Forget To Remember scooped the audience award as the 22nd Dublin International Film Festival (Diff) drew to a close on Saturday (March 2).

The Irish documentary is a collaboration with artist Asbestos, and explores the lived experience of Alzheimer’s, and the fragility and fortitude of memory.

Scroll down for the full list of Diff winners

“Although it’s a very personal film, Don’t Forget To Remember holds universal themes of love and loss, but most importantly, it’s about how we remember and shows how fragile those memories can be,...

Tj O’Grady Peyton last appeared on the pages of Dn as both director and actor in Wave, a film which shows a man isolated by the barrier of unintelligible language so it only seems fitting that his latest short, Broken: A Lockdown Story, is guided by a bizarre exploration of language and expressions. Tj worked with fellow London Film School graduate John Craine to create the story of a family who have seen better times as envisaged through the fantastical prism of its matriarch whose playful account belies the reality of the household’s situation. The film’s playful score and quirky narration, which has fun playing with recognisable idioms, are equally matched by its highly stylised scenes of outlandish capers and a delightfully dry sense of humour which runs throughout. We sat down with Director Peyton and Writer/Cinematographer Craine to delve into how they wove together a selection...

Other prizes include best Irish documentary, New Talent award.

Stacey Gregg’s psychological thriller Here Before has won best Irish film at this year’s Galway Film Fleadh, which closed its 2021 edition on Sunday, July 25.

Set in Northern Ireland, the feature stars Andrea Riseborough as a bereaved mother whose feelings of grief are compounded when a new family moves next door. Produced by UK companies Rooks Nest and Pia Pressure, it is backed by BBC Film and Northern Ireland Screen.

The feature was among those awarded as Galway wrapped its six-day Fleadh, a hybrid of outdoor, in-cinema and virtual screenings and events.