BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- Instead of being asked "Who are you wearing?" on the red carpet at the Academy Awards, the question for Ushio Shinohara should probably be "How old is that?!"

The eccentric 80-year-old Japanese artist and subject of the Oscar-nominated feature documentary "Cutie and the Boxer" is planning to wear the first tuxedo he ever bought after selling his debut painting in the early 1960s.

"He went out and bought a tuxedo for the opening (of his first gallery show) because he thought he needed one," said Zachary Heinzerling, the film's director, at a Wednesday evening event in Beverly Hills honouring this year's documentary nominees. "That same tuxedo still fits him 50 years later, so that's what he's wearing."

"Cutie and the Boxer" tells the story of the Shinohara and his sassy wife, Noriko, who is also an artist. To create the cinematic portrait of the dueling couple, Heinzerling filmed the Shinoharas over the course of five years.

The film is up against the battlefield expose "Dirty Wars," Indonesian death squad odyssey "The Act of Killing," Egyptian revolution recount "The Square" and backup singer memoir "20 Feet from Stardom" for the documentary feature trophy at Sunday's ceremony.