So, as Oscar season approaches, I'm obsessed with seeing as many of the contenders as possible. So I watch approximately 2 films a day. Let's see if I can give you a rundown of my thoughts on this season's contenders.

"Whale Rider" - visually wonderful. Score: 7
"Pieces of April" - funny and touching. 8
"The Cooler" - tough and gritty. 8
"Seabiscuit" - great story and style. 9
"Looney Tunes: The Movie" - too frantic. 5
"Brother Bear" - Ecch! 3
"The Missing" - violent and magical. 7
"The Human Stain" - boring. 5
"Girl with the Pearl Earring" - beautiful. 6
"Elf" - charming and hilarious. 8
"The Cat in the Hat" - I fell asleep. 5
"Shattered Glass" - informative. 7
"Pretty Little Things" - ponderous. 6
"City of God" - amazing. 9
"Triplets of Belleville" - wonderful. 8
"Fog of War" - scary. 7
"Love, Actually" - wonderful, romantic. Take a date. 8
"21 Grams" - too disjointed. 6
"Bus 174" - excellent. 8
"The Station Agent" - good. 7
"Elephant" - inventive. 7
"In the Cut" - raw, exciting. 7
"Finding Nemo" - fantastic. 10
"Kill Bill" - the best. 10

You'll be happy to know that "Hair High" is almost finished - we're just putting the last of the scenes together for the final edit, then it's on to the last of the sound, including music, and then we start doing the lab work that results in the final print. Then it's off to the festival circuit, and that's where I discover whether it's going to make money or not.

It's a big gamble, making these animated features, but it's a gamble that I must take - no one else will invest in my stories and, quite frankly, I enjoy having complete control of the filmmaking process. Sometimes I lose big time, like with "J. Lyle" and "Guns on the Clacakamas" and sometimes I do OK, like with "I Married a Strange Person" and "Mutant Aliens".

So, the question is, how will "Hair High" do? That's up to you folks to decide - watch this site for info on the screenings, and check out the excerpted scenes from the film - we hope to occasionally show sequences from the film from time to time - let me know what you think.

Today's cartoon, page 17 of "Sloppy Seconds", is "What Do People Talk About?" One of the best sources of humor is taking a cliché and switching it, like, say a mountain climber climbing a mountain - how about a mountain climbing a mountain climber? So, here I took the cartoon cliché of a person with a talk balloon and switched it to show dialogue with a person balloon. It's a bit too conceptual here, but I think it works.

See you next time,

Bill