by Nathaniel R
Frozen 2 is clearly hoping to be the first animated franchise to win the Animated Feature category twice.
The Oscar race is officially on for Best Animated Feature. 32 films are planning to compete, which is easily a record as there are usually closer to 22 or so, so we'll definitely have 5 nominees again this year. But the question is which. We've divvied the 32 films up into types to make this easier to process...
The American Mainstream Studio Offerings
Abominable
The Addams Family
The Angry Birds Movie 2
Frozen II
How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part
The Secret Life of Pets 2
Spies in Disguise
Toy Story 4
Six of the nine most high profile films are sequels and the animation branch hasn't shown a great love for those in the past. In the 18 years of this category, there haven't been many sequels nominated and the only one that won was Toy Story 3. All of which we think means there might be a big window of opportunity here for Oscar voters to get a bit more adventureous this year... but voters haven't ventured away from Disney and Pixar very often in terms of wins so perhaps either Toy Story 4 or Frozen 2 will make history by becoming the first franchise to win twice in this category.
Streaming Contenders
Klaus (Netflix)
Genndy Tartakovsky’s ‘Primal’ – Tales of Savagery (Prime)
We have high-hopes for Klaus in terms of a nomination but will it be loved enough to win? We're confused about the Primal eligibility since as far as we were aware it was a TV series streaming on Prime. Or have they fused all the episodes into a feature and if so, how exactly is it eligible?
The Specialty House
Missing Link (Laika)
Laika's never missed the category when they had a candidate for inclusion, though they've yet to win. Missing Link will be an interesting test case because, though it's wonderful, it flopped quite brutally in the American marketplace. Can Oscar attention give it a second life?
White Snake
The Overseas Blockbusters
Ne Zha (China)
Promare (Japan)
Weathering With You (Japan)
White Snake (China)
No Chinese pictures have yet been nominated for the Oscar in this category though Japanese films have been up on occassion, though only Spirited Away (2001) managed a win. Promare and Ne Zha both already received US releases, earning over a million each in specialty runs. But sadly no international features ever seem to really crossover. American audiences are weirdly resistant to foreign animated features even though many of them are dubbed and appropriate for children. It's an odd blind spot our nation's parents have!
Ne Zha and Weathering With You (which will see US release in 2020) are both also submitted in the Best International Feature race. No film has been nominated in both categories though one film which tried it, Waltz With Bashir, did get nominated for International Feature.
A Documentary
Rezo (Russia)
An autobiographic film about a Georgian artist
I Lost My Body
Art Films & International Titles
Another Day of Life (International, EFA Winner 2018)
Away (Latvia)
Buñuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles (Spain)
Children of the Sea (Japan)
Dilili in Paris (France)
Funan (France/Cambodia)
I Lost My Body (France, Annecy winner, Cannes Critics Week winner)
The Last Fiction (Iran)
Marona’s Fantastic Tale (France)
Okko’s Inn (Japan)
Pachamama (France/Luxembourg)
The Swallows of Kabul (France)
This Magnificent Cake! (Belgium, the shortest entry at just 44 minutes)
The Tower (France)
Upin & Ipin: The Lone Gibbon Kris (Malaysia)
Only four of these have gotten a run in US theaters but the ones that had vanished in a blip. Okko's Inn was the only minor success earning $134,000 in arthouses. Bunuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles earned $36k Funan earned $15k and This Magnificent Cake! just $7k