Jan 11, 2024

Interview with Oscar Nominees: Directors Lucija Murjak and Morten T. Inakov on Their Favorite Shots in "Eeva" (Exclusive Interview)

We invited the makers of the 15 films nominated for this year's Academy Awards for Best Animated Short to share their favorite shots from their films and why. Each film is listed in the order the materials were received. Voting for the nominations will begin today, January 11, and run through January 16. [For this film, directors Lucija Mrzljak and Morten Tšinakov received the Alexey Parker Award at the Berlin International Film Festival, which premiered in competition, followed by the Annecy International Film Festival, the Best Croatian Short Film at the Zagreb International Film Festival, the Nashville International Film The film won the Alexei Parker Award at the Annecy International Film Festival, the Best Croatian Short Film Award at the Zagreb International Film Festival, and the Best Animated Short Film Award at the Nashville International Film Festival.

With no dialogue, "Eeva" depicts the aftermath of a funeral as a widow adjusts to living alone. Surrounded by mourners and having had too much to drink, she struggles to conform to the way others believe a widow should mourn.

Below, Murjak and Tosinakov share their favorite shots from the film and tell us what they mean:

This was the first scene we created. When we finished it we were very pleased with the way it looked. It shows the general mood of the first half of the film.

From that point on we were excited about creating the rest of the scenes.

To develop the aesthetics of the film, we looked at some of Lucilla's old paintings, some of which we thought fit the story very well. Lucilla's paintings are 100% hand-drawn and very detailed, so if we wanted to use them as they were, it would have required a much larger budget than we had.

Read other entries in the series so far: