15 docs advance in Oscar race

December 3, 2012 by Barry Walsh

Fifteen documentaries have made the initial shortlist for the upcoming Academy Awards, from which five nominees will be selected.

One hundred and twenty-six films had originally qualified.

The shortlisted docs and their production companies, as listed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and supplemented by realscreen, are as follows:

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (Never Sorry LLC) Directed by Alison Klayman

Bully (The Bully Project LLC) Directed by Lee Hirsch

Chasing Ice (Exposure) Directed by Jeff Orlowski

Detropia (Loki Films) Directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady

Ethel (Moxie Firecracker Films) Directed by Rory Kennedy

5 Broken Cameras (Guy DVD Films) Directed by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi

The Gatekeepers (Les Films du Poisson, Dror Moreh Productions, Cinephil) Directed by Dror Moheh

The House I Live In (Charlotte Street Films, LLC) Directed by Eugene Jarecki

How to Survive a Plague (How to Survive a Plague LLC) Directed by David France

The Imposter (Imposter Pictures Ltd.) Directed by Bart Layton

The Invisible War (Chain Camera Pictures) Directed by Kirby Dick

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God (Jigsaw Productions in association with Wider Film Projects and Below the Radar Films) Directed by Alex Gibney

Searching for Sugar Man (Red Box Films) Directed by Malik Bendjelloul

This Is Not a Film (Wide Management) Directed by Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb

The Waiting Room (Open’hood, Inc.) Directed by Peter Nicks

The Academy’s documentary branch viewed the eligible documentaries for the preliminary round of voting. Members of that branch will now select the five nominees from among the shortlist’s 15 titles.

The nominations for the 85th annual Academy Awards will be announced on Thursday, January 10, at 5:30 a.m. PST. The awards ceremony will be take place on Sunday, February 24.

More follows.

Tags: 5 Broken Cameras, Academy Awards, Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, Bully, Chasing Ice, DETROPIA, Ethel, How to Survive a Plague, Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, Searching for Sugar Man, The Gatekeepers, The House I Live In, THe Imposter, The Invisible War, The Waiting Room, This Is Not A Film