Tuesday, November 16, 2010

The Race for This Year's Animated Oscar


The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed that there will be only three nominations for the animated feature Oscar this year, as only fifteen films have qualified for the award nomination.  The rules for the category, as set forth by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences require a minimum of sixteen qualified films to allow for a field of five nominations.

Toy Story 3 is considered a shoe-in for a nomination, if not the award itself.  DreamWorks' How to Train Your Dragon is also considered to have a lock on a slot.  That leaves Disney's Tangled in the unenviable position of having to duke it out with a number of other generally well-received films such as Universal's Despicable Me and the recently released Megamind from DreamWorks.  Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue is the only other Disney qualifier and most certainly a non-player in the race.  Shrek Forever After likely has long odds considering that Shrek the Third was shut out of a nomination back in 2008.  If Toy Story 3 should bring the statue home, it would extend Pixar's winning streak in the category to an unprecedented four years.   Considering that both prior Toy Story films predated the inauguration of the Animated Feature category in 2001, Academy voters may see this as an opportunity to belatedly reward the entire franchise.

Nominations will be announced January 25, 2011.  Awards will be presented February 27.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Toy Story 3 is actually NOT being nominated for the category -- only for the best picture category. I think they are really gunning for it to win best picture and feel that if it is in both categories, it will most likely only win best animated.

Jeffrey Pepper said...

Anonymous--

What's the source of your info? THR made no such reference in their article, nor did any other major news source that I've noticed.

TS3 would be a very long shot for a Best Pic Oscar. I would think Disney would play it safe and settle for noms in both categories, like they did with Up last year.

Jeffrey Pepper said...

Okay, I saw the interview with Rich Ross where he says they are going to push for a Best Pic win, but that doesn't rule out a nomination for Animated Feature.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of "Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue", why haven't you ever done or posted reviews of any of the Tinker Bell/Disney Fairies movies?

It'd be nice to know what you thought of them, Jeff.