Annie Award nominations: It's "Soul" vs "Wolfwalkers" again
Wednesday, March 3, 2021 at 1:01PM
NATHANIEL R in Annie Awards, Best Animated Feature, Soul, Wolfwalkers, animated films, precursor awards

by Nathaniel R

This just in: Soul and Wolfwalkers are tied for most nominations (10) for the 48th annual Annie Awards, honoring the best in animated entertainment. Onward is in a distant third place with 7 nominations. The Annie  ceremony will be virtual event this year, streamed live on April 16th at 7 PM PST. 

The full list of nominations (NOW UPDATED WITH WINNERS!) and some commentary after the jump...

BEST FEATURE

Since critics awards and precursors have been so ultra focused on Soul this year, it remains to be seen whether these other mainstream titles will have lots of support from Oscar voters. Can Pixar snag two nominations? Will The Croods: New Age being a box office hit in a year without those things, help it past Oscar's resistance to sequels? (The absence of Over the Moon is noted but it does show up in some other categories.)

 

BEST INDIE FEATURE

Ride Your Wave

 

All of these are eligible for the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, too. We know Oscar loves Aardman so Shaun the Sheep has a good shot and Wolfwalkers will obviously be there. But can either of the Japanese titles surprise... or maybee France's Calamity Jane? The latter was nominated for the EFA prize for Best Animated Feature. (Studio Ghibli's Earwig and the Witch isn't nominated here but does score in a feew other categories. )

We have a weird hunch that Calamity Jane is going to make the Oscar list but this hunch has no real backing. We'll see.

 

BEST SPECIAL PRODUCTION

 

The Snail and the Whale is also a finalist for Best Animated Short. Sally Hawkins voices the titular snail. Shoom's Odyssey a French & Dutch language 26 minute short did pretty well at the Annies as it features into the storyboarding category, too. Wonder why it wasn't on Oscar's longlist? 

BEST SHORT SUBJECT

KKUM

 

 

None of these titles are in the finalist list for Oscar's Animated Short though only KKUM (which looks very cool) and World of Tomorrow 3 (brilliant obviously; it's Don Hertzfeldt) were eligible.

 

BEST SPONSORED

 

 

BEST TV/MEDIA – PRESCHOOL

 

 

BEST TV/MEDIA – CHILDREN

She-Ra and the Princess of Power "Heart Part Two"

 

BEST TV/MEDIA – GENERAL AUDIENCE

 

 

BEST STUDENT FILM

 

 

BEST FX FOR TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST FX FOR FEATURE

Over the Moon

 

 

BEST CHARACTER ANIMATION – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST CHARACTER ANIMATION – FEATURE

The Willoughbys

 

 

BEST CHARACTER ANIMATION – LIVE ACTION

 

Not sure why this category has only four nominees. Almost everything else has five.

 

BEST CHARACTER ANIMATION – VIDEO GAME

 

Not sure why this category has only four nominees. Almost everything else has five.

 

BEST CHARACTER DESIGN – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST CHARACTER DESIGN – FEATURE

Queen Barb in Trolls World Tour

 

Is it just my imagination or didn't the Annies used to note which characters these nominees had designed?

 

BEST DIRECTION – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST DIRECTION – FEATURE

Calamity Jane

 

Interesting that these don't line up well with the top category. There's only 1 from that category (Soul) as well as one film that didn't get a Feature nomination (Over the Moon) and then 3 nominees from the Indie Feature category (Calamity Jane, Ride Your Wave, Wolfwalkers). 

 

BEST MUSIC – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST MUSIC – FEATURE

 

 

Only Soul made Oscar's finalist list for Best Score.

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN – FEATURE

Wolfwalkers

 

 

BEST STORYBOARDING – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST STORYBOARDING – FEATURE

Soul

 

 

You might remember the name Trevor Jimenez from a past Oscar race. He directed the short Weekends which was Oscar-nominated for 2018.

BEST VOICE ACTING – TV/MEDIA

 

 

Do you watch any of these shows? In that case do you like these nominations? We're sad that Big Mouth isn't here. 

BEST VOICE ACTING – FEATURE

Vanessa Marshall for Earwig and the Witch

 

 

Nicolas Cage also played Grug in the original Croods (2013) but he wasn't nominated  for it. Aside from Cage and Holland, the Annies chose supporting characters for the nominations this time around. Vanessa Marshall is a well regarded voice actor. She's been up for 8 "Behind the Voice Actor" awards these past several years (though she hasn't won).  Robert G Chiu and Eva Whitaker are both children... so two Hollywood stars are up against two child actors and one respected adult voice actor. Interesting mix!

 

BEST WRITING – TV/MEDIA

 

 

BEST WRITING – FEATURE

 

 

BEST EDITORIAL – TV/MEDIA

To Gerard

 

 

This actually refers to film editing. To Gerard and If Anything Happens I Love You are both Oscar finalists for Best Animated Short

BEST EDITORIAL – FEATURE

 

 

 

FOUR JURIED AWARDS
These final prizes are non-competitive and will be going to the following people.

WINDSOR MCCAY AWARD - Overall Career Honor

JUNE FORAY AWARD - A charitable impact kind of honor

UB IWERKS - a Technical Achievement honor 

SPECIAL ACHIEVEMENT

 

Article originally appeared on The Film Experience (http://thefilmexperience.net/).
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