Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

Onlinewsma Absolutely Brilliant!

Cooktopi The acting in this movie is really good.

Kirpianuscus the films about Shoah are many. but "Toyland" is different. for its intensity. for its switch. for the exploration of an explanation and a fundamental decision. and, sure, for something who remains out of words. because it is a film about hope. and about miracle in a form who seems so easy to define than remains deep way impressive. a mother, her son, theirs neighbors.and a piano. nothing more but enough for a so intense film, profound provocative, than it becomes a serious challenge for the viewer. to become himself. in better version.

Robert Reynolds This short won the Academy Award for Live Action Short. There will be mild spoilers ahead: The basic premise of this short is that a Jewish family is about to be deported to a camp and when another boy whose best friend is among those going away asks his mother just where they're going, she tells him what she thinks is a comforting lie-that his friend David is going to "Toyland".Naturally, the other little boy, Heinrich, wants to go with his friend, only to be told by everyone that he can't go, with no real explanation, just that he can't go. He decides he's going, regardless of what anyone says and so he packs a bag and follows them to the train.His mother finds out he's missing and races off to find him before it's too late. She encounters unfeeling, uncaring neighbors and suspicious SS men, one of whom thinks shes Jewish herself. Ultimately, they believe that she's serious and they go to check the train.The ending of the short is quite good and should be seen. This short is on DVD/Blu-Ray as part of a compilation of Academy Award winning animated and live action shots released by Shorts International. The short itself is very good and the compilation is excellent. Most recommended.

sashank_kini-1 Usually, I don't watch short films but after seeing and reviewing about five feature films in three days, I needed to see a movie that could capture a gamut of emotions in few minutes and that is precisely what 'Toyland' does. It takes one of the most crucial periods in history - the holocaust and brings it down to the lives of two families and an incident that changes the course of their lives in the dark period.A mother finds her son Heinrich missing one day, after she tells him the previous day that their neighbors are moving to Toyland. The prospect of going to a place filled with toys titillates Heinrich and he gets too eager to go with the neighbors, which includes his best friend Paul. The first seven minutes oscillate between flashbacks of Heinrich's excitement and the mother's frantic search. This leads to an end that is so poignant, gripping, chilling and fascinating that it brought tears to my eyes. The fourteen minute film so effortlessly manages to touch the audiences that it truly deserves all the accolades that it has got. 8 out of 10.

MartinHafer Today I went with three friends to a special showing of all the films nominated for the 2009 Oscar for Best Live Action Short. Oddly, the four of us were in pretty much agreement about the films. Our pick for best of the nominees was PIG ("Grisen"), though ON THE LINE ("Auf der Strecke") was a very good film and is nearly as deserving of the award. We predicted that TOYLAND ("Spielzeugland"), however, will win the award because it's the sort of the film the Academy tends to like AND because PIG might ruffle some feathers because it is not "politically correct". I'll update this review after the awards are given.TOYLAND is a film set during the Nazi era. A boy asks his mother about why all his neighbors (all Jews) are disappearing. She explains that everything is okay and that they have gone to "Toyland". Unfortunately, it sounds like such a nice place that the kid hopes to go there, too, and the film begins with him sneaking off with a shipment of Jews to the concentration camps because he wants to visit this magical place.Much of the film consists of the mother trying to find the boy and eventually the SS officers help her to try to locate the boy. This all ends in a marvelous twist that I won't reveal here, but this twist takes the film from the ordinary to the extraordinary.A lovely film that will probably win--in part, because the film is about an important subject that the Academy seems to like, the Holocaust (and highly reminiscent of LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL), and in part because it is so exceptionally well-crafted from start to finish. My only reservation is that the print was awfully dark--practically everything looked black at times. Perhaps it was just a bad print.UPDATE: It's official, TOYLAND is the winner. This didn't surprise me at all and it was well deserving of the award, though I was still pulling for PIG to take the honors.