Oscar for Best Animated Feature 2016

[estefan]

Seriously? They nominated Sing over a ton of great indie movies? There's The Red Turtle, April and the Extraordinary World, Phantom Boy, Miss Hokusai, Your Name, Long Way North, 25 April, The Little Prince... Did they even bother watching any of these before voting?

They nominated My Life as a Zucchini, which is a surprise, since they don't tend to nominate small indie or foreign films in the Animated Feature category (though some, like The Wind Rises and Persepolis, they nominated for best foreign film). So I assume they saw the others. I actually thought The Little Prince would have a decent shot with the Golden Globes, since it's a mostly European membership. GKIDS is the distributor of April and the Extraordinary World, Phantom Boy and Miss Hokusai as well as Zucchini, so I'm certain they made sure the Globes voters watched their films.

This is just a really competitive year for animation and Sing has gotten good reviews. Maybe they just liked it more than Finding Dory, Sausage Party and the other contenders. The Golden Globes and Oscars are voted on by completely different memberships, so these nominations won't affect the Oscar nominations that much. Especially with the animation branch, which tends to think for themselves. The Annie Awards are still your best harbinger for what will get nominated at the Oscars.

[Flanger-Hanger]

I could see Moana winning simply because Academy members will have seen it more recently than most of the other nominees.

[DisneyJedi]

I'd really like to know how they decide which movie gets nominated and which gets snubbed.

By the way, I'm still baffled that they went and snubbed The Lego Movie, which was fantastic.

[estefan]

"Snubs" don't exist. Are there films that receive more attention? Yes. Are there films that surprisingly don't get nominated? Yes. These sorts of awards organisations are often seen as some single unit with a singular opinion. However, they rather tend to consist of multiple people with multiple individual votes. The Academy, for example, has over 7000 individual voters, none of whom are voting the same way. I'm sure you could collectively ask every person on this forum to name their favourite animated film of the year and there would be a number of different responses, each based on our own unique tastes.

As much as people threw conspiracy theories around about why The LEGO Movie didn't make the final five nominations, I think the most likely answer is the most simple: Those five films got more voters. Not as a slight against The LEGO Movie. I'm sure LEGO got a fair amount of votes, too. It did get an Annie Award nomination for Best Animated Feature and there is a cross-section of ASIFA members who also vote for the Animated Feature Oscar nominees (as opposed to the Golden Globes, where there isn't). Just less than the animated features that did make it in to the final Oscar nominations.

[Tangled]

By the way, I'm still baffled that they went and snubbed The Lego Movie, which was fantastic.

The problem with The Lego Movie is that it's not targetted at the average Academy voter. It's unabashedly loud and "modern", and it centers around the celebration of a brand name. Granted, the movie's message is to avoid blindly following capitalist ideals, but since the Academy voters don't seem to think very hard about animation nominees they probably didn't care. The voters probably judged the brand name and the hyperactive pacing. It's similar to how many people complain about Wreck-it Ralph losing against Brave. However, Brave is more conventional and therefore it is "safer" to recommend to an older audience, and a lot of Wreck-it Ralph's appeal centered around retro video games, which probably turned off many voters who held no nostalgic attachment.

However, since The Academy has been diversified and the average age has probably been pushed down since 2014, and since the animation category is pretty stacked this year, I think voters may think about their votes harder this year. Sure, Academy voters will probably always have a bias towards Disney/Pixar movies over the other nominees, but it's nice to think that movies like Your Name and My Life as a Zucchini have high chances to get nominated. Just a few years ago I probably would have assumed that American movies with lukewarm reception like Secret Life of Pets or Trolls would have gotten nominated over them instead.

Also, Your Name is really beautiful. Would recommend. I'm unsure if it's my favourite animated film of the year, but damn, it truly deserves the mainstream attention. However, I do think it could suffer for some people from following typical anime conventions. I'm okay with that because I watch currently-airing TV anime as a way to satisfy my craving for hand-drawn animation, but I could see it being too "anime" for some. It also may not click with Academy voters because it focuses on Japanese teenagers, and it's not timeless like Ghibli movies tend to be.

[D82]

The Academy has announced the list of songs and the list of soundtracks eligible for a nomination. I'm surprised "You're Welcome" is not on the list of eligible songs when it was submitted by Disney. "How Far I'll Go" and "We Know The Way" are the only two songs from Moana that appear on the list. Maybe they decided not to submit it after all, because they have seen "How Far I'll Go" is performing better in other awards. I'm also surprised Moana is eligible for Best Score. If I remember it correctly, other recent Disney musical films were considered ineligible because that rule that says that a score is ineligible "if it has been diminished in impact by the predominant use of songs".

[Sotiris]

Maybe they decided not to submit it after all, because they have seen "How Far I'll Go" is performing better in other awards.

That's what I believed happened as well. There's nothing about the song that makes it ineligible so clearly Disney just decided not to submit it after all.

I'm also surprised Moana is eligible for Best Score. If I remember it correctly, other recent Disney musical films were considered ineligible because that rule that says that a score is ineligible "if it has been diminished in impact by the predominant use of songs".

Scores from musicals are not eligible by default but because the rules on that are kind of vague and subject to interpretation, studios submit them anyway just in case. Disney submitted the score from Frozen as well. The list of submissions is just that; it does not necessarily mean that all of the submitted entries are eligible. It's up to the Academy to determine which of the scores are ineligible and exclude from the selection after they've been submitted. The entries that are deemed ineligible post-submission are rarely revealed to the public. Since the new rule was put into effect, there hasn't been a single nomination for Best Score that comes from a musical.

[D82]

I'm also surprised Moana is eligible for Best Score. If I remember it correctly, other recent Disney musical films were considered ineligible because that rule that says that a score is ineligible "if it has been diminished in impact by the predominant use of songs".

Scores from musicals are not eligible by default but because the rules on that are kind of vague and subject to interpretation, studios submit them anyway just in case. Disney submitted the score from Frozen as well. The list of submissions is just that; it does not necessarily mean that all of the submitted entries are eligible. It's up to the Academy to determine which of the scores are ineligible and exclude from the selection after they've been submitted. The entries that are deemed ineligible post-submission are rarely revealed to the public. Since the new rule was put into effect, there hasn't been a single nomination for Best Score that comes from a musical.

OK, thanks for the clarification.

[estefan]

Scores from musicals are not eligible by default but because the rules on that are kind of vague and subject to interpretation, studios submit them anyway just in case. Disney submitted the score from Frozen as well. The list of submissions is just that; it does not necessarily mean that all of the submitted entries are eligible. It's up to the Academy to determine which of the scores are ineligible and exclude from the selection after they've been submitted. The entries that are deemed ineligible post-submission are rarely revealed to the public. Since the new rule was put into effect, there hasn't been a single nomination for Best Score that comes from a musical.

The list of eligible scores are released to the public and the scores deemed ineligible have led to controversy and the filmmakers and composers attempting to reverse the decision, usually to no avail. Arrival, which was just nominated for a Golden Globe for best original score, was ruled ineligible for the Oscars after it was submitted. Manchester by the Sea was another submitted score they've ruled ineligible, much to the composer's disappointment.

The scores for The Revenant and Birdman were also ruled ineligible in recent years, much to the annoyance of Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu.

So this is, in fact, the list of eligible scores. I also think the probable winner is La La Land, which was ruled eligible. I think they ruled Moana eligible to not look hypocritical and biased, though it's probably a long shot for the nomination anyway.

[disneyprincess11]

So, Moana is eligible. It would be nice for them to get a nom.

[Sotiris]

The list of eligible scores are released to the public and the scores deemed ineligible have led to controversy and the filmmakers and composers attempting to reverse the decision, usually to no avail.

Sometimes submitted entries are ruled ineligible prior to the release of the list and sometimes afterwards. This means that not all of the contenders on the publicly-available list are necessarily eligible. The examples of scores you cited were ineligible for other reasons, not because they were scores from musicals. Scores from musicals are more difficult and time-consuming to assess and usually have their eligibility requirements reviewed after the list has been released. For example, The Princess and the Frog appeared on the Academy's list but was later disqualified. However, the score of the non-musical Where the Wild Things Are from the same year was disqualified earlier and did not appear on the list. I need to note that not every disqualified entry will be made public (unless a trade publication picks up on the story) as the Academy doesn't usually issue press releases about that.

A similar process occurs in the Animated Feature category as well. For example, Alvin and the Chipmunks did appear on the Academy's list but was later disqualified. This again proves that the list of contenders released by the Academy are not necessarily eligible.

[ce1ticmoon]

Apparently, My Life as a Zucchini is one of 9 films on the shortlist for the Foreign Film category. If it snags a nomination, that'll be a first since Waltz with Bashir. I don't know what this means for its chances in the Animated Film category considering Waltz was nominated for Foreign but not Animated, but this seems significant nonetheless.

It seems to me that Zucchini may be emerging as the front-runner among the non-mainstream films.

[kiseki]

Makoto Shinkai has a problem, a big problem. His mystical teenage body-swap movie “Your Name.” has become such a massive hit it’s beginning to worry him.

“It’s not healthy,” the boyish director says. “I don’t think any more people should see it.”

Every week it gets closer to being the biggest Japanese animated film of all time.

And now there’s talk of Oscars. “I really hope it doesn’t win,” he adds.

Source: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/201 ... to-shinkai

[unprincess]

dont worry Makoto, you probably wont win anyway. You might not even score a nom. the Academy doesn't like watching "Chinese !&$@! things."

Apparently, My Life as a Zucchini is one of 9 films on the shortlist for the Foreign Film category. If it snags a nomination, that'll be a first since Waltz with Bashir.

didn't The Wind Rises get a nom for foreign film last year?

[ce1ticmoon]

didn't The Wind Rises get a nom for foreign film last year?

Sorry, I meant for the Oscars, not the Golden Globe.

[Sotiris]

For the first time since the implementation of the new rules, scores from musicals will be eligible this year. While the rules haven't officially changed, the music branch of the Academy has decided to be more lenient in the interpretation of the rules regarding scores from musicals. This essentially renders the rules meaningless and allows the Academy to arbitrarily choose which score is eligible or not which puts into question their integrity. They should either allow all scores from musicals to compete or none of them. It makes no sense to disqualify, for example, the score from Frozen or Tangled but allow the score from Moana to compete. It's ludicrous.

Oscar Eligibility Decisions Give Musical Scores a Shot
http://variety.com/2017/film/spotlight/ ... 201952519/

[Sotiris]

The BAFTA nominations are out. Update: Kubo and the Two Strings won.

Best Animated Film

Finding Dory
Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
Zootopia


The European Film Awards nominations are out. Update: My Life as a Zucchini won.

European Animated Feature Film

My Life as a Zucchini
Psiconautas: The Forgotten Children
The Red Turtle


The César Awards nominations are out. Update: My Life as a Zucchini won.

Best Animated Feature

The Girl Without Hands
My Life as a Zucchini
The Red Turtle

[D82]

The Producers Guild nominations have also been announced today. These are the films nominated for Best Animated Feature:

Finding Dory
Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
The Secret Life of Pets
Zootopia

[Sotiris]

The Oscar nominations have just been announced.

Best Animated Feature

Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
My Life as a Zucchini
The Red Turtle
Zootopia

Best Animated Short

Blind Vaysha
Borrowed Time
Pear Cider and Cigarettes
Pearl
Piper


Kubo and the Two Strings was also nominated in the Best Visual Effects category becoming the second only fully-animated feature to ever be nominated in this category (the first one being The Nightmare Before Christmas). The Jungle Book was nominated in this category as well.

Moana also received a nomination in the Best Original Song category for the song "How Far I'll Go". Trolls was nominated in the same category for the song "Can't Stop the Feeling".

The partially-animated Life, Animated received a nomination in the Best Documentary Feature category.

[disneyprincess11]

You forgot Trolls being nominated for "Can't Stop the Feeling." Really shocked it got in

Congrats to all! Great year for animation!