Best Live Action Short Oscar 2012 Prediciton: Curfew

Again, like a lot of the animated shorts, the live action short selections are very lopsided gender-wise.  I watched the trailers for all five, and Asad and Buzkashi Boys seem to be the ones that might be the most moving, though they're similar in that they both have Western filmmakers depicting the dire lives of third-world boys.  Last year, the lighthearted Irish short The Shore won.  It was middling on the IMDb in comparison to its competition and it wasn't a festival favorite either.  I have no idea if the fact that its creator Terry George was twice-nominated for screenwriting features in the past played a role, besides the story being about two old friends being reunited after a quarter-of-a-century.  The year before, The New Tenants was fourth on the IMDb rating scale, directed by a commercial director, featuring Hollywood actors.  A German director won for the World War II drama Toyland.  The beloved God of Love didn't have a war setting, but it did have love darts.  In the Oscar-winning Spanish/French crime comedy Le Mozart des pickpockets, two street urchins take a young boy under their wings.  West Bank Story featured Israeli and Palestinian star-crossed lovers in a fast food musical comedy and won in this category.  This year, Curfew is the popular favorite, but Death of a Shadow may be the most distinct.

Asad 
[IMDb: 7.3, 180 users; 1 review: 7.0]
Asad has won at multiple festivals and its director Bryan Buckley has won a DGA award for directing commercials.  Asad involves a young Somali boys in a survival tale with cast completely made up of unprofessional refuges.  You can watch the trailer here. His partner Mino Jarjouri produced.

Buzkashi Boys
[IMDb: 6.9, 146 users; 2 reviews: 8.0]
Sam French won multiple festivals with his short about two boys in Kabul with differing hopes and dreams.  Looks awfully touching.  You can watch the trailer here.  Ariel Nasr produced.

Curfew
[IMDb: 7.7, 220 users; 2 reviews: 7.5]
Shawn Christensen has won a slew of awards on the festival route and he's arguably the IMDb and Gold Derby favorite.  Curfew concerns a fuck-up who develops a relationship with his niece.  You can watch the trailer here, which features the cool song "Trust" by Alexander.  Christensen wrote the screenplay to the Taylor Lautner flop Abduction.  The subject matter almost makes me not want to predict it, but, from the trailers, strikes me as the most solid and distinguished of the five.  It also has the biggest presence on Facebook.

Death of a Shadow
[IMDb: 7.2, 192 users; 2 reviews: 8.5]
Tom Van Avermaet has won one festival with his short.  This cinematically filmed story about a World War I-era man who collects shadows seems to be the most technically proficient, suggesting eclectic shades of Jean-Pierre Jeunet.  You probably should watch the trailer here for a better understanding.  It looks original, but could it be too cryptic?  Ellen De Waele produced.  It would probably be my alternate guess.

Henry
[IMDb: 7.0, 151 users; 2 reviews: 9.0]
Yan England has won many awards for previous short Moi.  Henry takes you into the mind of a man suffering from dementia lamenting his lost love.  I think.  Might Henry get the Amour vote?  You can watch the full short here.  England is super hot and is also an actor on the French-Canadian TV series Trauma and Yamaska.

What does Gold Derby have to say?
There is something for everyone.  Most of them are picking Curfew, which was my guess (as well as the lazy choice) before I looked them up.  Death of a Shadow has three pundits behind it: Geler, Lodge, and Pond.  Buzkashi Boys has two: Hammond and Horgan.  Tariq Khan is going out on a limb for Henry and Scott Feinberg is sticking with Asad.

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