Travel Blog

Last night we went to Cinema Paradiso to watch the five short films that have been nominated for Oscars this year. We were going to see The Reader but decided it might be too commercial. Also, we'd watched an interview with Kate Winslet on CBS Sunday Morning and she seemed a little too obsessed with winning an Oscar. Shouldn't it be - or shouldn't they at least pretend it is (they're actors after all) - all about the craft? As Kingsley Amis said of literary awards: "They're all right, I guess, if you win them."

The five shorts - French, Irish, Danish, German (2) - were more enjoyable than most of the films I've recently seen because they were more authentic. The longest was 30 minutes, the shortest 11. It's amazing what you can do on screen in 11 minutes - especially when you're not tied to a formula or directives from marketing or a puerile need for special effects.

The Irish film, New Boy - based on a Roddy Doyle story - looks at the age-old themes of schoolboy bullying - and solidarity - through the lens of immigration. The wonderful German film, On the Line, tells the story of a department store security officer who becomes infatuated with one of the saleswomen.

My pick for the Oscar, though, is the Danish film The Pig which examines - deftly, wittily, succinctly - the ideas of tolerance and individual rights. A Danish man, admitted to the hospital, develops an attachment to the painting of a pig on his wall, which is promptly removed when a new patient, a Muslim, arrives. It is a little masterpiece that ends with a perfect O. Henry twist. Hooray for non-Hollywood.