"The Long Goodbye" is a co-production between the United Kingdom and Netherlands from 2020, so not super new, but the pandemic with all its delays also "helped" in postponing this film a bit and as a consequence it is nominated for an Oscar now in 2022. In the live action short film category. I think most people are off the opinion that this is the most likely winner, even if this category is really wide open every year. But it also seems to be getting easier to predict now in the 2020s compared to what it was like ten years ago or so. We will see if this really wins. I absolutely hope it will not. By far the worst nominee. They already picked a pretty bad film as winner last year, but this one here would be even lower. If it does win, then it is once again proof that it is all about political agenda and not about really good filmmaking here and that would be quite sad. The writer and director was Aneil Karia and his co-writer was lead actor Riz Ahmed. Definitely the biggest name you find in the nominated short films this year. He is there early on too, but it is way more about the second half when all focus is on him really as he performs a rap number on the street while a true tragedy happens only a few meters away from him. His music performance was quite poor. He may be a talented actor in other projects, but his rapping did not win me over one bit. But he was not the key problem here.
The key problem is that this is a film that will only create further tension and not solve anything. When was the last time you heard about a group of radical right-wing fascists walking the streets, destroying doors, getting everybody outside, forcing them to kneel down and then shoot them all in the head? This is not something that happens in reality. Not anymore at least. I am not sure about 80 years ago. Or when slavery existed. So is this supposed to serve us as an example what happens if we do not stay alert and step up against discrimination and racism? I just don't see the point. Of course, the shock value is massive, but if it is not delivered to us with a convincing or at least touching story, then it is really nothing other than shock value. Very limited approach. Difficult to even call it a movie for me. The camera work felt shoddy and all over the place for the most part and don't tell me this was all intentional and a stylistic choice. At least not fully. Ahmed speaking to us directly when he watches the camera was supposed to be haunting, but seemed only try-hard to me. Anything positive I can say here? Yeah well, one/some of the girls was/were pretty cute in the scene up there when they were dressing up or so. That is all. The rest of the film is despicable in my opinion and it will do no good, only stir up trouble, so the fewer see it, the better. Another reason why I hope it will not win the Oscar because such a triumph would mean additional attention. By the way, at 13 minutes it is also the shortest from the nominees, which is a good thing. Don't be fooled by the title. My lowest possible rating for this one and I absolutely do not recommend the watch. Sad to see Ahmed agree to be a part of this mess. I thought he would see through this. He's a double Oscar nominee and Emmy winner after all. Sigh. Be better than him and don't be among those applauding the outcome here. Or, even better, skip the watch.
The key problem is that this is a film that will only create further tension and not solve anything. When was the last time you heard about a group of radical right-wing fascists walking the streets, destroying doors, getting everybody outside, forcing them to kneel down and then shoot them all in the head? This is not something that happens in reality. Not anymore at least. I am not sure about 80 years ago. Or when slavery existed. So is this supposed to serve us as an example what happens if we do not stay alert and step up against discrimination and racism? I just don't see the point. Of course, the shock value is massive, but if it is not delivered to us with a convincing or at least touching story, then it is really nothing other than shock value. Very limited approach. Difficult to even call it a movie for me. The camera work felt shoddy and all over the place for the most part and don't tell me this was all intentional and a stylistic choice. At least not fully. Ahmed speaking to us directly when he watches the camera was supposed to be haunting, but seemed only try-hard to me. Anything positive I can say here? Yeah well, one/some of the girls was/were pretty cute in the scene up there when they were dressing up or so. That is all. The rest of the film is despicable in my opinion and it will do no good, only stir up trouble, so the fewer see it, the better. Another reason why I hope it will not win the Oscar because such a triumph would mean additional attention. By the way, at 13 minutes it is also the shortest from the nominees, which is a good thing. Don't be fooled by the title. My lowest possible rating for this one and I absolutely do not recommend the watch. Sad to see Ahmed agree to be a part of this mess. I thought he would see through this. He's a double Oscar nominee and Emmy winner after all. Sigh. Be better than him and don't be among those applauding the outcome here. Or, even better, skip the watch.