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However, the last entry, 20 Feet from Stardom, should not be lightly ignored. The story follows the lives of a group of back-up singers to mega-celebrities like Sting and Bruce Springsteen. It details the importance of their roles in making a hit out of songs that are “today” in the everyday vernacular, explores some of the reasons why many of them have never achieved fame on their own, and follows some of them through trying and difficult moments in their lives and careers. The movie, like last year’s winner Searching for Sugarman, is ultimately an uplifting music documentary and there is a chance that history can repeat itself. Recall that approximately 80% of Academy members have never been nominated for an Oscar. So, it is not unfathomable to think that many will identify with the essential person whose career always stays in the shadow of the main celebrities. Of course, the fact that Sugarman just won last year may prompt other members to seek something different this time around. It is for that reason that I am predicting The Act of Killing as of right now, but I think that any of the four other than Cutie and The Boxer stand a real chance of winning.

Best Documentary Short Subject

The Documentary Shorts offer some stories that are incredibly parallel both to the feature-length films, and, remarkably, to each other. The first we can discard is The Cavedigger, the odd story that follows an eccentric Arizona artist who dedicates his life to building residences inside rock formations in people’s property. The film follows, you guessed it, his trials and tribulations as an artist, but is far less uplifting and, frankly, far less interesting than 20 Feet from Stardom. It is ultimately, to put it bluntly, hard to find much inspiration in a man who builds caves for a living, beautiful as they may be.

I would also discount the chances of Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall to take home the Oscar. This short follows a World War II veteran in his dying days in a hospice center established by members of a maximum security prison, where he is serving life for murder. The piece reminds me of the winners in this category in the last two years. Two years ago, the Oscar went to Strangers No More, about a school in Israel where a remarkably generous and devoted group of teachers dedicated their lives to incorporating children of refugees into the community by teaching them Hebrew and English. Then, last year, Saving Face, a movie about a compassionate Pakistani plastic surgeon who devotes a part of his life to operating on female victims of acid attacks. To be sure, it may very well be that those movies won not because of the talent of the documentarian but because of the nobleness of the enterprise they followed.

Regardless, it is clear that Prison Terminal is trying to tap into the emotions that took these two movies to the podium to the extent it narrates the noble volunteer work that inmates serving life sentences do to care for the elderly among them. But Prison Terminal falls well short of the two winning efforts I just described, because it cannot help but focus on the patient who is in the title of the movie itself, making the movie seem less important and ultimately losing the focus on the true heroes of the story. It will get some votes, but I doubt it wins.

Next is Karama Has No Walls, a movie remarkably similar to the feature-length nominee, The Square, in that it follows the story of people involved in an Arab-Spring revolution, this time people in Yemen. What becomes clear quickly, however, is that most of the footage is from the cameras of incredibly brave young men who actually participated in the demonstrations that toppled the 33-year old Yemeni dictator, and not from the documentarian herself. Still, like with Saving Face or Strangers No More, some members may see fit to reward the subjects themselves and vote for the movie. Indeed, some of the scenes they capture are so moving, unbelievable, and evocative that they would not be an undeserving winner.

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