A Chinese cartoon movie "Beautiful Forest" has made its way to the preliminary stage in the Best Animated Short Film category of the 2017 Academy Award.

一部中国动画电影《美丽的森林》已经通过2017年奥斯卡金像奖最佳动画短片的初选阶段。

The 7-minute long movie has no lyrics but only background music created by ancient instruments.

The film is based on gongbi-style paintings, which usually depict birds and flowers in an artistic manner with intense colours.

The story of "Beautiful Forest" revolves around a group of birds perching and eyeing up their prey. Eventually a gun is seen to be pointing at one of the birds.

The film ends with a gunshot and a hole in the the painting.

The film was directed, scripted and sketched all by Yang Chun, a graduate from the Central Academy of Fine Arts.