Friday, November 18, 2005

Toon Town

Tis the season. Following on the heels of the Documentary finalists announced, here ar the 10 finalists for the three slots in the Animated Feature race.

The finalists in alpha order: Chicken Little, Gulliver's Travel, Hoodwinked, Howl's Moving Castle, Madagascar, Robots, Steamboy, Tim Burton's Corpse Bride, Valiant, and Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

The animated category is more difficult to predict each year than it has any right to be, given the lack of competition. It's always tough to say whether they'll go for the art or the commerce here. They could, theatrically, have less than three nominees given their rules. But I doubt they will. I am dreading seeing a Chicken Little nomination. But I bet they go there. Damnit.

12 comments:

Calum Reed said...

I actually think they might dig Robots back up. It's one of the more successful commercial animations of the year.

My prediction:

Corpse Bride
Robots
Wallace and Gromit

Javier Aldabalde said...

i want corpse bride to win. great gothic fun.

John T said...

I'm guessing Madagascar bests Chicken Little (it'd be better if it was Howl's Moving Castle, though).

John T said...

Anyone know why Pooh's Hefflelump Movie didn't qualify?

Anonymous said...

Wasn't Pooh's Heffalump Movie too short? I'm not positive, but I think it clocked in at less than 70 minutes.

Anyway, I too figure AMPAS'll throw its third nomination to Madagascar instead of Chicken Little. Unless...they decide one stop-motion nominee is sufficient and end up snubbing Corpse Bride altogether. Then W&G, Madagascar AND Chicken Little could make it.

This category is stupid. Hmph.

NATHANIEL R said...

be careful what you wish for. I thought it was so cool to have a way to award animated films and i've hated it ever since. I wish they'd cancel the category and if something is seminal (beauty and the beast) it has to try and compete with the live action stuff.

it just makes no sense to have three nominees when there are only 10 eligible things. The live action films have to compete against hundreds of other movies.

adam k. said...

Yeah, I'm thinking W&G, Corpse Bride and one of the commerical successes, hopefully Madagascar. But I think a Corpse Bride snub is possible.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Oscar's heart was is the right place when he formed this ghetto new category. But in the end all it's really done, I think, is justify AMPAS's inability to consider animated ("kids") films equal to their live action counterparts. Oh well. At least this way "Spirited Away," "Finding Nemo" and "The Incredibles" can advertise themselves as Oscar winners...

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I saw a copy of Spirited Away in the store today and it said Academy Award Winner 2003 and I actually smiled. It seems that except for it's first year, the worthy winner did indeed win it's just that it doesn't seem like the other nominees were ever in the running. so, a lot of a lot of the other categories really.

Cal, if they're going purely on box-office then Robots would only place third, after Madagascar and Chicken Little.

The best selections would be Wallace & Gromit, Corpse Bride and Howl's Moving Castle, but I'm predicting:

Corpse Bride
Hoodwinked
Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit


Hoodwinked seems like the type of pop-culture tinged CG they might go for, plus it has a late December release date, which reminds me a lot of Jimmy Neutron. Plus, it's a Weinstein Company release.

-Glenn

Anonymous said...

Well, I for one am happy for the category. I've been happy with the winners each year (except arguably 2001). I'm actually surprised by the comments about this year. In my opinion, this is the first year they can produce three deserving nominees in Corpse Bride, Howl's Moving Castle, and Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. Madagascar and Robots were actually solid entertainment, so I won't die if they snub only ONE of the films above. I will go crazy if Chicken Little gets in. It was really kind've bad. I haven't seen Steamboy, but anime fanboys say it's really good and Hoodwinked looks intriguing. Come on guys, look alive!

Anonymous said...

The only way Steamboy is going to get in is if they want to reward Otomo (the director) for making Akira all those years back, which in all things wouldn't be such a bad move. Akira is a big fave of mine. One of the only non-Miyazaki animes I can actually stand.

-Glenn

Anonymous said...

Best regards from NY! » »