ArmInfo.n. "The Last Repair Shop", a short documentary featuring an Armenian man who was persecuted in the 1980s in Azerbaijan, won an Oscar at the 96th Academy Awards. The film is directed by Ben Proudfoot and Kris Bowers.
As stated on the website of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (A.M.P.A.S.), "The Last Repair Shop" won in the "Documentary Short Film" category.
The documentary tells the story of four devoted craftspeople who help keep over 80,000 student musical instruments in good repair in the city of Los Angeles, led by the charming general manager, Steve Bagmanyan, who faced ethnic persecution in Azerbaijan in the 1980s. The film blends the unexpectedly intimate personal histories of the repair people with emotional, firsthand accounts from the actual student musicians for whom their instruments made all the difference.
"The Last Repair Shop" was selected for the Oscar shortlist out of 114 films presented in the "Short Documentary Film" category. "The Last Repair Shop" is now available to watch on Disney+ and Hulu as well as on The Times' YouTube channel and latimes.com, as part of the L.A. Times Short Docs series.The film premiered in September 2023 at the 50th Telluride Film Festival. In November 2023, the film was named Best Documentary Short at the Critics Choice Documentary Awards in New York.
Notably, 20 Days in Mariupol, directed by Mstyslav Chernov, won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature . The film tells the story of the 20 days that Chernov spent with his colleagues in besieged Mariupol after the start of Russia's military invasion of Ukraine.