Oscar’s Doc Shortlist

Every year, the members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Documentaries Screening Committee select a shortlist of fifteen films that are eligible for consideration for nomination for an Oscar for Best Feature Documentary. From this list of fifteen films, five will be selected by all voting members of the Academy’s Documentaries Branch for actual nomination for the Best Documentary Feature Oscar. For 2012, the selection committee chose the fifteen films on the shortlist from 124 films that met the Academy’s eligibility requirements. The year’s biggest documentary box office grossers (films as diverse as the concert film JUSTIN BIEBER: NEVER SAY NEVER, BORN TO BE WILD, ONE DAY, GLEE CONCERT MOVIE, IN A BETTER WORLD, FORKS OVER KNIVES, Errol Morris’ TABLOID, Morgan Spurlock’s THE GREAT MOVIE EVER SOLD, Steve James’ THE INTERRUPTORS and Werner Herzog’s CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS) were this year’s high profile documentaries that did not make the cut. Oscar nominations will be announced on January 24, with the ceremony to be held on February 26.

The lucky 15 films still in the running include:

• BATTLE FOR BROOKLYN (Michael Galinsky and Suki Hawley)
• BILL CUNNINGHAM, NEW YORK (Richard Press)
• BUCK (Cindy Meehl)
• HELL AND BACK AGAIN (Darfang Dennis)
• IF A TREE FALLS (Marshall Curry)
• JANE’S JOURNEY (Lorenz Knauer)
• THE LOVING STORY (Nancy Buirski)
• PARADISE LOST 3: PURGATORY (Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky)
• PINA (Wim Wenders)
• PROJECT NIM (James Marsh)
• SEMPER FI: ALWAYS FAITHFUL (Tony Hardmon and Rachel Libert)
• SING YOUR SONG (Susanne Rostock)
• UNDEFEATED (Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin)
• UNDER FIRE: JOURNALISTS IN COMBAT (Martyn Burke)
• WE WERE HERE (David Weissman and Bill Weber)

FFT Webmaster

The FFT Webmaster use displays whenever an article has multiple authors. It also pops up on articles from old versions of Film Festival Today. The original author byline might be missing! In that case, if you are the author of such an article and see this bio instead of your own, please send us an email. Some of our contributors that might be missing bylines are: Brad Balfour, Laura Blum, and Sandy Mandelberger, among others.