5 reasons to watch ‘Three Sisters’ — a 2026 Oscar-nominated animated movie (STILLS)
The animated short earned its creator, Russian director Konstantin Bronzit, his third Oscar nomination.
1. This is the director's third Oscar-nominated animated movie
Konstantin Bronzit has already received two Oscar nominations. He received his first in 2009 for his movie ‘A Toilet Story — A Love Story’: A 10-minute elegy about a toilet cleaner who dreams of happiness and is embarrassed when she starts finding abandoned bouquets of flowers.
He was nominated for a second time in 2016 for the movie ‘We Can't Live Without Space’, about two cosmonauts. When one of them dies, the other, who remained on Earth as a reserve, is decommissioned and falls into depression. But, they can't report this: The officials who arrive see only an empty spacesuit and a hole in the ceiling.
2. ‘Three Sisters" is not connected to Chekhov
The cartoon has no connection to Anton Chekhov's famous play. According to the plot, three sisters live on an island and, in order to improve their finances, decide to rent out a room in their house. With the arrival of a new tenant — a sea wolf with a pipe in his teeth – their peace is disrupted.
The sisters trade their boring gray outfits for bright clothes and fight relentlessly for the bearded man's affections. One brings him coffee, another does his laundry, while the third goes on a boat trip with him.
3. The plot is partially inspired by a Montenegrin legend
Bronzit worked on the cartoon for six years. He had already drawn the house where the heroines live when he learned of a Montenegrin legend about three sisters, told in the town of Prčanj. They loved a sailor and waited for him to return from a voyage until their respective deaths. After each funeral, one of the windows in the house was closed and only the last remained open, symbolizing an unfulfilled dream. Intrigued, the director decided to look at this house and was surprised to realize that he had drawn almost exactly the same one.
4. There is no dialogue in the cartoon
For the entire 15 minutes of ‘Three Sisters’, no one speaks, only the cries of seagulls and the sailor's satisfied grin. But, he will be understood anywhere in the world.
5. The director made the movie under a pseudonym
The credits list ‘Timur Kognov’ as the director. His biography can be found online: He was born in 1969 in Georgia, drew storyboards for TV shows and feature movies and lives in Toronto. It was with this background that ‘Three Sisters’ was presented at the Russian ‘Message to Man’ festival and selected for the Santa Barbara festival, where he won the award for ‘Best Animated Short Movie’.
By concealing his real identity, Bronzit, in his own words, decided to conduct a social experiment – he wanted to see if a movie could achieve success solely on its own merits.
He later confessed to the jury and selectors of the Santa Barbara festival that he was the author. They expressed surprise ("what a captivating twist, and what an interesting journey you and your film have taken") and thanked the director for being part of his bold experiment.
Bronzit submitted his Oscar application under his own name. The winners will be announced on March 15.
