While the world was watching the stars on the red carpet, a Spaniard won an Oscar. The Hollywood Academy, in an attempt to achieve a shorter ceremony, decided that this year eight statuettes would be left out of the gala. They were delivered an hour early and in the television broadcast they were reduced to a short video. Among them are categories as essential for cinema as editing and soundtrack, where Alberto Iglesias competed, who fell to Hans Zimmer of ‘Dune’. However, Alberto Mielgo from Madrid won the statuette for his animated short film ‘The Windshield Wiper’.
Mielgo was not the favorite since all the pools pointed to ‘Robin Robin’ as the winner, a piece from the Aardman studio that had co-production and support from Netflix. However, academics surrendered to the dazzling workmanship and poetry of ‘The Windshield Wiper’, in which the filmmaker, winner of three Emmys, has invested seven years in his PinkmanTV studio, financing it personally with the support of other creator friends. . The short lacks a typical plot. A character, the director’s alter ego, questions the meaning of love and we see different situations that exemplify it: a couple on the beach, a drunk on the street, a man ringing a doorbell…
More information about the Oscars
Mielgo has cut his teeth as an entertainer around the world since he left Spain at the age of 18. He has lived in London, Berlin, Tokyo and Los Angeles. He began in children’s animation films in Spain such as ‘The Legend of the Pirate Blackbeard’ and ‘El Cid: The Legend’. He worked on Tim Burton’s ‘Corpse Bride’ and took charge of the artistic direction of the ‘Tron: Uprising’ series. He was hired to direct the artistic direction of ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’, although he was fired after two years due to artistic differences with Sony. The Netflix short series ‘Love, Death and Robots’ features a dazzling work of his, ‘The Witness’.
Video. Watch the short film.
‘The Windshield Wiper’ was already selected in the Directors’ Fortnight at the last Cannes Film Festival. For this self-taught Madrid native from 1979, who at the age of ten was already drawing 40-page comics, the Oscar means independence and the possibility of being able to continue carrying out his personal projects. For the 15 minutes of the film he employed more than 70 people. A lover of animated film classics and Japanese authors, although reluctant to follow “the dictatorship of Pixar and Disney aesthetics”, Alberto Mielgo will continue exploring animation for adults without limits.