The short film \u201cThe Girl Who Cried Pearls,\u201d directed by Montrealers Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski, won the Oscar for best animated short film at the awards ceremony on Sunday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Canadian talent shone brightly at the 98th\u00a0Academy Awards\u00a0ceremony , held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, as Toronto\u2019s Maggie Kang also won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film for the hit movie \u201cKPop Demon Hunters\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Girl Who Cried Pearls,\u201d a stop-motion animated short film produced by the National Film Board (NFB), has been screened at more than 40 festivals and has already received several awards.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Set in early 20th-century Montreal, the short film tells the story of a poor boy who falls in love with a mysterious young girl who cries pearls at night.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For filmmakers, this Oscar represents much more than their own project.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe see this as the culmination of several decades of public policy,\u201d said Szczerbowski in a telephone interview, praising the support provided to the arts by the Canadian cultural funding system.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He thanked the public film producer for \u201callowing eccentrics like us, who, at over 50 years old, still play with dolls, to create things that truly inspire the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA billion people have just heard about our country,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The animation duo had already been nominated in the category of best animated short film at the\u00a0Oscars\u00a0in 2007, for \u201cMadame Tutli-Putli\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cK-pop warriors\u201d shine<\/p>\n
It was a great night for animation, with the Oscar going to Canadian-Korean director Maggie Kang for \u201cK-pop Warriors,\u201d a film she wrote and co-directed with Chris Appelhans.<\/p>\n
This fantasy musical film, which tells the story of a K-pop (Korean pop) demon-hunting group, is the most-watched film in Netflix history.<\/p>\n
Upon accepting her award, an emotional Kang dedicated her victory \u201cto all Koreans,\u201d lamenting that it had taken so long \u201cfor those of you who look like me\u201d to be represented in a successful film like this one.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it\u2019s done. And that means future generations won\u2019t have to dream about it,\u201d she said, fighting back tears.<\/p>\n
The song from the film \u201cGolden,\u201d performed by Ejae, Audrey Nuna, and Rei Ami (who portray the fictional K-pop group Huntrix), became the first K-pop song to win the Academy Award for Best Original Song.<\/p>\n
The creators of \u201cFrankenstein\u201d were rewarded.<\/p>\n
The Canadian craftsmen of Guillermo del Toro\u2019s \u201cFrankenstein\u201d also had reason to rejoice on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Production designer Tamara Deverell and set designer Shane Vieau won the Oscar for best production design, while Jordan Samuel and Cliona Furey were part of the team awarded for best makeup and best hairstyling.<\/p>\n
Behind the scenes, Lavis recounted that the event had turned into a veritable impromptu celebration of Canadian cinema.<\/p>\n
\u201cBehind the scenes, it was us, Maggie Kang and the whole \u201cFrankenstein\u201d team \u2014 a veritable guard of honour of Canadians who were reuniting, hugging, taking pictures and celebrating this landmark moment in Canadian cinema.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
This victory was particularly significant for Messrs. Lavis and Szczerbowski, as their families were present to witness it.<\/p>\n
Lavis also took the opportunity to address a broader issue affecting the Canadian arts community.<\/p>\n
He pointed to the rise of streaming giants like Netflix and Amazon, which he said are profiting from the Canadian public but \u201cdo not contribute enough\u201d to funding culture in the country.<\/p>\n
The Online Streaming Act, which is not yet fully implemented, requires foreign streaming platforms to contribute to the financing of Canadian film and television production.<\/p>\n
Several platforms, including Amazon and Apple, are challenging the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission\u2019s decision that would require foreign platforms generating more than $25 million annually in Canada to contribute 5 per cent of their local revenue to Canadian programming.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe cannot compete with these giants without funding cultural production. It\u2019s impossible,\u201d said Lavis.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis includes making Amazon, Netflix, and all those companies that benefit from preferential treatment in this country pay taxes. I believe it\u2019s important that they contribute not only through films, but also to the Canada Media Fund and other Canadian funds. This is absolutely essential to our survival.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The short film \u201cThe Girl Who Cried Pearls,\u201d directed by Montrealers Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski, won the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":540116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194292],"tags":[49,48,2338],"class_list":["post-540115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-montreal","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-montreal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/540116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}