Often at the Oscars, the art and talent involved in the creation of films is overshadowed by the celebrity of the awards for Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Motion Picture. However, some truly entertaining and brilliant work has come out of the Best Animated Shorts category, which started at the fifth Academy Awards in 1932.

According to the official Academy Award rules, films entered in the category run 40 minutes or less and must have been exhibited for paid admission in a commercial motion picture theater in Los Angeles County.

Past nominees include Pixar’s popular shorts, like “Day & Night” and “La Luna.” MGM’s “Tom & Jerry” shorts also won seven Oscars in the 1940s and ‘50s.

Bijou Arts Cinema is currently screening all the shorts nominated for an Academy Award, as well as three additional shorts. Shows are Feb. 11-13 at 12:40 p.m. and 10 p.m at the Bijou’s downtown location (43 West Broadway St.)

“Feral” by Daniel Sousa and Dan Golden

This 13-minute short features a monochromatic color scheme and beautiful hand drawings to tell the story, without dialogue but with mystical music, of a feral boy brought into civilization by a hunter. The short showcases the power of animation, with one simple frame showing the transformation of the boy into a wolf, deer, bird, leaf and finally to a boy again. ”Feral” is director Daniel Sousa’s first Oscar nomination.

“Get a Horse!”  by Lauren MacMullan and Dorothy McKim

This short, played before “Frozen,” pays homage to Disney’s late 1920s “Mickey Mouse” cartoons. The short begins with Mickey and his friends taking a wagon ride, complete with cartoon music notes bouncing across the screen. The ride takes them into the future, showing the now more commonly seen CGI Mickey. MacMullan is the first woman ever to solely direct an animated Disney film.

“Mr. Hublot” by Laurent Witz and Alexandre Espigares

This 12-minute tale from Luxembourg and France’s directors features a small OCD man afraid to leave his house, a post industrial technology-saturated world, where he lives with several mechanical creatures. The computer animation is stunning and intricate, and the short has already won several awards.

“Possessions” by Shuhei Morita

This 14-minute Japanese cartoon film is about a man who enters a shrine and is transported into another world. Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away has been the only Oscar-winning animated Japanese film thus far, and “Possessions,” with its social commentary on material goods and intricately drawn vibrantly colored characters, may be the second. This is director Shuhei Morita’s first Oscar nomination.

“Room on the Broom” by Max Lang and Jan Lachauer

This 27-minute British short resembles a more episodic children’s show than the other nominees, both in length and use of dialogue. Simon Pegg (“Shaun of the Dead,” “The World’s End”) and Gillian Anderson (“The X-Files”) lend their voices, as the storybook-style narrator and witch. The short was created with 3-D computer animation as well as miniature sets. “Room on the Broom” has already won several awards and is based on a British children’s book.