j1nman

For me I'd have to say Grave of the Fireflies. It is in my top 10 of films and probably my favorite anime.

Rivero

My favorite would have to be La Jetee, a 30 minute black-and-white French short from 1962 composed almost entirely of stills shot on an animation stand. Taking place after the Earth has been destroyed from a nuclear war, it's about a boy who witnesses a man die at an airport- and the boy focuses more on a beautiful woman who was waiting for the man. I saw this on HBO when I was about 8 years old, around 1985 and it freaked me out: the black and white, the heart beating throughout the soundtrack, the weird imagery and story and how it seemed to bring it's stillness to life as it progressed. It stuck with me for a long time. Little did I know as I walked into an opening night screening of Terry Giliam's 12 Monkeys ten years later that it was, in fact, based on the premise of that weird short I saw long ago. Although there are definite similarities between La Jetee and 12 Monkeys, La Jetee works on an intense rhythm that rises and falls in a perfect cadence, building up to a climactic moment in which the stills of which the movie is made up start going so fast that a character actually starts moving. There is nothing I have experienced in cinema like it. Although not necessarily for everyone, I feel it is a singular work of genius. I occasionally see it playing on the Sundance Channel and the DVD can be found quite easily.

DonnachaOne

Though I've never experienced a short quite like Rivero has...

... I still regularly watch The Wrong Trousers.

Drexl

Citizen Kane

SilverScreen

Anything with Bugs Bunny

Jackskeleton

So a short is now under 2 hours? wow. what's a 15 minute short considered now a days? A super super short?

Groucho

A 1'59" film is a short?

garolo

By the way it's not a short anymore. It's temporally challanged cinema.

And I agree with silverscreen. Anything with Bugs is OK by me.

Norm de Plume

I think a short is officially considered anything under 60 minutes. With that criterion in mind, I'd choose what is without a doubt the most horrifying movie ever made, Cutting Moments (1998). La Jetee (1962) and Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge are also fabulous.

Groucho

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "a motion picture that is not more than 40 minutes in running time (including all credits)."

theneobez

Night and Fog

cruzness

I always liked the old Tom and Jerry short films

Giles

The Red Balloon
Vincent
Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life
1300CC (featured in this last past years 'Spike and Mike's Sick & Twisted Festival of Animation')
The Snowman
Wallace and Gromit

sundog

Guy Maddin's The Heart of the World

wendersfan

Les Mistons
Zero de Conduite
Toby Dammit
Life Lessons

RyoHazuki

More

muggins

Father & Daughter
Fits & Starts

Rypro 525

thats over 2 hours by about a minute

Doc Moonlight

I haven't seen it in 20 years, but I'd have to say that my favorite short film is "Der Dove" an hilarious take-off on Ingmr Bergman films. It's in black and white with English subtitles and performed in a faux language that's part English, part Swedish and part Yiddish. At the film's climax, the hero and Death play badminton. I'd love to have a copy!

Michael Corvin

Horses on Mars.

Due out on the next Gate to the Mind's Eye dvd. (plug for a friend)

I loved a bunch of the ones that came with the Film Fest dvd's. Some of those were brilliant.

kmac2878

According to both IMDB and RottenTomatoes, it's actually under two hours by about one minute.