How to watch the Oscar-nominated shorts and what to expect

Short-film nominees at the 98th Academy Awards are unusually easy to see

This year’s short-film lineup at the 98th Academy Awards gives movie lovers a rare chance to catch work that usually lives on the festival circuit. Thanks to a theatrical initiative spearheaded by Taika Waititi and Roadside Attractions, most of the 15 Oscar-nominated shorts are playing in cinemas or available online. That wider distribution makes it simpler to follow emerging voices and revisit the early work of filmmakers who’ve since moved into features.

The programs traverse intimate memoirs, historical reckonings, speculative fables and satirical sketches. Many directors began in the short form, so this slate doubles as a preview of future cinematic personalities. Below is a friendly guide to the main categories, standout titles and a few predictions to help you decide what to watch during awards season.

Documentary shorts: compressed, humane reporting

These documentaries are short but sharply felt—brief windows into urgent lives and issues. Some use the tools of journalism, others rely on quiet observation, but all aim to leave a lasting impression.

Notable nominees
– All the Empty Rooms follows CBS reporter Steve Hartman and photographer Lou Bopp as they document schoolrooms left untouched after shootings. The film pairs archival silence with interviews of bereaved parents, creating a haunting meditation on absence.
– Armed Only with a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud is an elegiac portrait of the photojournalist Brent Renaud, killed while covering the war in Ukraine. Co-directed and edited by his brother Craig Renaud, it mixes family memory with frontline footage to show the human cost faced by reporters.
– Children No More: ‘Were and Are Gone’ captures weekly silent demonstrations in Tel Aviv where activists display printed photos of children killed in Gaza. The piece functions as visual protest, using repetition and portraiture to give public form to private grief; it’s played theatrically but hasn’t reached wide U.S. streaming yet.
– The Devil Is Busy offers an intimate look inside an Atlanta abortion clinic through the steady presence of Tracii, the security lead. The film’s observational lens finds resilience in routine: small gestures of care and protection amid persistent pressures.
– Perfectly a Strangeness follows three donkeys trekking across the Chilean desert toward an abandoned—but still functioning—space telescope. Meditative and oddly surreal, the short privileges mood over exposition, inviting viewers to linger on texture and sound.

Documentary prediction
All the Empty Rooms has the visibility advantage: repeated broadcasts and streaming exposure have made it familiar to voters. Its arresting imagery and sustained presence in the conversation suggest it’s the front-runner here.

Animated shorts: tactile techniques and emotional compression

The animated nominees range from painterly experiments to tactile stop-motion and compact, character-driven comedies. Many lean on handcrafted textures or limited palettes to condense feeling into a few minutes; others rely on razor-sharp timing to land an emotional or comic punch.

Standouts
– Butterfly tells the life of Alfred Nakache, a French-Algerian Olympic swimmer who survived Auschwitz and returned to competition. The film’s painterly animation renders memory and endurance in lyrical strokes.
– Forevergreen follows an orphaned bear cub raised by an evergreen tree. Part myth, part naturalistic character study, it centers attachment and loss with detailed animation and a quietly poetic tone.
– The Girl Who Cried Pearls is a stop-motion fable about inheritance and a mysterious pearl. Its tactile materiality gives the piece an uncanny, intimate atmosphere.
– Retirement Plan imagines a man’s twilight years through a single reflective narrator—Domhnall Gleeson voices regret, restraint and small revelations.
– The Three Sisters stages three siblings on an isolated island without dialogue, relying on choreography and theatrical staging; its decision to play mainly in theaters underscores the work’s dependence on physical presence.

Animated prediction
Butterfly’s ambitious visual language and the personal link between director and subject have generated strong festival buzz and sold-out screenings—momentum that could translate into an Oscar win.

Live-action shorts: compact stories with big shape

Live-action shorts prove how much storytelling can fit into a tight frame: focused characters, neat structural turns and, often, sharp social commentary.

Key nominees
– Butcher’s Stain follows a Palestinian butcher working in an Israeli supermarket who becomes the target of accusations about desecrating hostage posters. The film mines vulnerability and suspicion within everyday spaces.
– A Friend of Dorothy pairs Miriam Margolyes with a theater-obsessed teen, delivering warmth and an intergenerational bond that unfolds with gentle humor.
– Jane Austen’s Period Drama is a Regency-era spoof that reframes courtship through candid discussion of menstruation, led by an eccentric figure named Estrogenia. The piece uses period trappings to sharpen contemporary debate about bodily autonomy and etiquette.
– The Singers is set in a working-class bar where an impromptu singing contest—underscored by a Leonard Cohen sequence—becomes a small communal act of healing and solidarity.
– Two People Exchanging Saliva is a dystopian, black-and-white satire in which kissing is illegal. Backed by The New Yorker and directed by Alexandre Singh and Natalie Musteata, it blends formal rigor with topical bite and feels like a compact proof of concept for a larger work.