While Wall-E as the greatest animated film in history is debatable(though many people would say it is), there is no doubt that Wall-E is the greatest achievement in animation and the most elaborately detailed and technically dazzling animation every committed to screen. Did these awards really want to award animation?
But seriously, Wall-E has greatness in the calling and masterpiece & cinema classic status in the pipeline, what are these trivial awards worth to it like Annies or even the Oscars.
Dismay. Not enough color and cartoony characters in Wall•E? Envy?
May a lynch mob of mobile trash compactors wreck their vengeance!
paul
Disaster Annie! It´s an outrage that Wall-E lost animated feature of the year to Kung fu Panda. Highest honor in animation, ha! You can complain about the Oscar but this kind of blunder they wouldn´t make.
It´s a scandal. They didn´t even make room among the top 5 for Wall-E in the categories of score and screenplay! I mean Madagascar 2 over Wall-E in screenplay?!!! Scandal. Annies. You should be ashamed.
Dario
I thoroughly enjoyed Kung Fu Panda, if not for its eye-popping visuals, dynamic action and unpretentiousness, then at least for the pitch perfect casting of Jack Black who IS a kung fu panda. A Metal kung fu panda! (“The Metal! It comes from hell”).
That’s why I’m enjoying this – I mean, come on, WALL-E is going to win the Oscar and I won’t mind, but I can’t help but feeling that all this larger-than-life grandieur attributed to it has been created post-festum, not the least by the Best Picture Oscar buzz.
All three nominees for Best Animated Feature are incredibly accomlished works and it’s tragic there weren’t five nominee slots this year, but Panda and Bolt (and Bashir and $9.99) would deserve the award every bit as much as WALL-E.
Also, remember that the animators and other animated film workers voted for this, and their view of the nominees was surely influenced by some insight into the technicalities and craft of the productions and such. Now, I’m not well-versed in animation, but maybe that tipped the scale to Panda’s favour?
paul
Sorry Dario, it´s nothing but a scandal. Every god damn critic in the world says Wall-E is superior.
Like I said, they didn´t even nominate Wall-E for screenplay and score (which both are oscarnominated, screenplay is still a rarity for animated movies and oscar). It´s embarrasing for them really.
Like you said Kund fu Panda was an entertaining movie but most agree that Wall-E is a classic, a masterpiece. This is like The Godfather would lose the oscar to What´s Up Doc.
Dario
Agree to disagree then, on the point of WALL-E being a masterpiece (it was very, very good, but had it been released last year, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. See: Ratatouille). Also, I repeat: the animation workers must’ve seen the films in a different light than us laymen that watch and judge an animated film the same way we would a live-action feature.
paul
Well I just find it incredibly hard to believe that they couldn´t find room to nominate Thomas Newman´s fantastic score for Wall-E. It´s just unbelievable, they have 5 spots and they can´t make room for it? That category have nothing to do with animation in itself so your theory about the animation workers seeing things we don´t, doesn´t apply there. It is clear to me that they didn´t like Wall-E and that is just a mystery. It´s almost like they tried to make a statement with these nominations and wins but all it did was make them look foolish.
Dario
I agree, the music category is baffling (I just looked over the winners, not the shortlists, so I didn’t catch the original score list, sorry).
“All three nominees for Best Animated Feature are incredibly accomlished works and it’s tragic there weren’t five nominee slots this year, but Panda and Bolt (and Bashir and $9.99) would deserve the award every bit as much as WALL-E.”
Dario, I see you’ve met the fence and that you are sitting on it.
I tend to think Guy is on to something. Maybe the voters are sick of Pixar hogging everything? Who knows, but this stinks royally. What if “Wall-E” had been a Best Picture nominee? It’d look even more ridiculous.
Dario
Haha :) Let me officialy get off the fence: I would’ve loved to see Bashir win, (the foreign-documentary-animated trifecta? Delicious). Now that’s off the board, I’m kinda ambivalent (as opposed to neutral) about who wins: Panda winning would make me happy, but if it loses, I won’t be disappointed. Remember when the nominees were crapfests such as Cimarron, Surf’s Up, Shark Tale or when Happy Feet actually won? Ugh. This is a good year, Oscar-wise.
paul
Oh well. It seems like I´m not going to pay any attention to the Annie Awards anymore. They just lost all their credibility to me after this.
I used to think they were fun because they were the only organization that had different categories just for animation. They want to and could be seen as the highest honor in animation because they specialize it it but after these horrible nominations and wins, who could take them seriously?
Dario
Speaking of, how come Wallace and Gromit: A Matter of Loaf and Death isn’t a nominee at the Oscars? Unelligible or snubbed?
I think you’re on to something when you say “envy”. Obviously, the voters are people with an agenda, otherwise they wouldn’t have given “Kung-Fu Panda” EVERY. SINGLE. AWARD.
Ben M.
Dario, the new Wallace and Gromit has only opened in England, not in America, I believe it will be eligible next year as long as it plays in America. And this Kunf Fu Panda sweep is just about the stupidest choice an awards group has made in a long time.
Fei
Dario, you are mistaken about the voting body of the Annies. While I’m sure that many industry pros are voters, membership to ASIFA is actually open to the general public, and if you’re a member, you get the right to vote. So in fact, many, if not most, voters ARE lay people. For this reason, the credibility of the Annies has always been dubious, but it’s been largely ignored since the awards have usually reflected the general consensus, except for weird years like this one.
Dario
Well, I guess they just liked the panda more, then.
OutOfSync
Fei is right.
Any member of ASIFA-Hollywood in good standing as of November 30, 2008 was eligible to participate in the final voting process of this year’s Annual Annie Awards.
Two categories of ASIFA-Hollywood membership were eligle to vote:
1) Patron Membership includes International Membership and provides a donation for the Animation Archive and Film Preservation projects, and is $150.00/year; and
2) General Membership ($75/year within the US/$100 outside the US) includes International Membership.
[…] so the latter was a good call. (Though if last night’s travesty is anything to go by, it seems animators reeeeaaally love the Panda.) But overall, is it surprising […]
I liked “Happy Feet” too. I find it wonderful that such a derange movie made, like, $400mil worldwide.
What does the year of release have to do with anything? Fact of the matter is a lot (A LOT) of people thought “Wall-E” was one of the best movies of 2008. There is no point arguing about whether it was one of the best movies of 2007 because there is never any possible way of gauging that.
Comments
26 responses to “‘WALL-E’ shut out of the Annie Awards?”
What the freaking hell?
Ugh. “Kung Fu Panda” was terrible.
While Wall-E as the greatest animated film in history is debatable(though many people would say it is), there is no doubt that Wall-E is the greatest achievement in animation and the most elaborately detailed and technically dazzling animation every committed to screen. Did these awards really want to award animation?
But seriously, Wall-E has greatness in the calling and masterpiece & cinema classic status in the pipeline, what are these trivial awards worth to it like Annies or even the Oscars.
Huh? Is this the result of some kind of petty industry politics I don’t know about?
I doubt Andrew Stanton is losing much sleep over this, though.
Bizarre. Perhaps they forgot to see “WALL-E”.
Dismay. Not enough color and cartoony characters in Wall•E? Envy?
May a lynch mob of mobile trash compactors wreck their vengeance!
Disaster Annie! It´s an outrage that Wall-E lost animated feature of the year to Kung fu Panda. Highest honor in animation, ha! You can complain about the Oscar but this kind of blunder they wouldn´t make.
It´s a scandal. They didn´t even make room among the top 5 for Wall-E in the categories of score and screenplay! I mean Madagascar 2 over Wall-E in screenplay?!!! Scandal. Annies. You should be ashamed.
I thoroughly enjoyed Kung Fu Panda, if not for its eye-popping visuals, dynamic action and unpretentiousness, then at least for the pitch perfect casting of Jack Black who IS a kung fu panda. A Metal kung fu panda! (“The Metal! It comes from hell”).
That’s why I’m enjoying this – I mean, come on, WALL-E is going to win the Oscar and I won’t mind, but I can’t help but feeling that all this larger-than-life grandieur attributed to it has been created post-festum, not the least by the Best Picture Oscar buzz.
All three nominees for Best Animated Feature are incredibly accomlished works and it’s tragic there weren’t five nominee slots this year, but Panda and Bolt (and Bashir and $9.99) would deserve the award every bit as much as WALL-E.
Also, remember that the animators and other animated film workers voted for this, and their view of the nominees was surely influenced by some insight into the technicalities and craft of the productions and such. Now, I’m not well-versed in animation, but maybe that tipped the scale to Panda’s favour?
Sorry Dario, it´s nothing but a scandal. Every god damn critic in the world says Wall-E is superior.
Like I said, they didn´t even nominate Wall-E for screenplay and score (which both are oscarnominated, screenplay is still a rarity for animated movies and oscar). It´s embarrasing for them really.
Like you said Kund fu Panda was an entertaining movie but most agree that Wall-E is a classic, a masterpiece. This is like The Godfather would lose the oscar to What´s Up Doc.
Agree to disagree then, on the point of WALL-E being a masterpiece (it was very, very good, but had it been released last year, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. See: Ratatouille). Also, I repeat: the animation workers must’ve seen the films in a different light than us laymen that watch and judge an animated film the same way we would a live-action feature.
Well I just find it incredibly hard to believe that they couldn´t find room to nominate Thomas Newman´s fantastic score for Wall-E. It´s just unbelievable, they have 5 spots and they can´t make room for it? That category have nothing to do with animation in itself so your theory about the animation workers seeing things we don´t, doesn´t apply there. It is clear to me that they didn´t like Wall-E and that is just a mystery. It´s almost like they tried to make a statement with these nominations and wins but all it did was make them look foolish.
I agree, the music category is baffling (I just looked over the winners, not the shortlists, so I didn’t catch the original score list, sorry).
“All three nominees for Best Animated Feature are incredibly accomlished works and it’s tragic there weren’t five nominee slots this year, but Panda and Bolt (and Bashir and $9.99) would deserve the award every bit as much as WALL-E.”
Dario, I see you’ve met the fence and that you are sitting on it.
I tend to think Guy is on to something. Maybe the voters are sick of Pixar hogging everything? Who knows, but this stinks royally. What if “Wall-E” had been a Best Picture nominee? It’d look even more ridiculous.
Haha :) Let me officialy get off the fence: I would’ve loved to see Bashir win, (the foreign-documentary-animated trifecta? Delicious). Now that’s off the board, I’m kinda ambivalent (as opposed to neutral) about who wins: Panda winning would make me happy, but if it loses, I won’t be disappointed. Remember when the nominees were crapfests such as Cimarron, Surf’s Up, Shark Tale or when Happy Feet actually won? Ugh. This is a good year, Oscar-wise.
Oh well. It seems like I´m not going to pay any attention to the Annie Awards anymore. They just lost all their credibility to me after this.
I used to think they were fun because they were the only organization that had different categories just for animation. They want to and could be seen as the highest honor in animation because they specialize it it but after these horrible nominations and wins, who could take them seriously?
Speaking of, how come Wallace and Gromit: A Matter of Loaf and Death isn’t a nominee at the Oscars? Unelligible or snubbed?
@ DarkHandOfSigourneyWeaver:
I think you’re on to something when you say “envy”. Obviously, the voters are people with an agenda, otherwise they wouldn’t have given “Kung-Fu Panda” EVERY. SINGLE. AWARD.
Dario, the new Wallace and Gromit has only opened in England, not in America, I believe it will be eligible next year as long as it plays in America. And this Kunf Fu Panda sweep is just about the stupidest choice an awards group has made in a long time.
Dario, you are mistaken about the voting body of the Annies. While I’m sure that many industry pros are voters, membership to ASIFA is actually open to the general public, and if you’re a member, you get the right to vote. So in fact, many, if not most, voters ARE lay people. For this reason, the credibility of the Annies has always been dubious, but it’s been largely ignored since the awards have usually reflected the general consensus, except for weird years like this one.
Well, I guess they just liked the panda more, then.
Fei is right.
Any member of ASIFA-Hollywood in good standing as of November 30, 2008 was eligible to participate in the final voting process of this year’s Annual Annie Awards.
Two categories of ASIFA-Hollywood membership were eligle to vote:
1) Patron Membership includes International Membership and provides a donation for the Animation Archive and Film Preservation projects, and is $150.00/year; and
2) General Membership ($75/year within the US/$100 outside the US) includes International Membership.
Other than paying the membership, there is no other requirement for membership. The membership application is here: http://www.asifa-hollywood.org/pics/ahmemberform.pdf
At the risk of getting totally lynched, I liked “Happy Feet.†It’s flawed and frequently mental, but at least it’s interesting.
Plus, it totally helped me win my Oscar betting pool two years ago. (Why more people didn’t see that “upset” coming, I’ll never know.)
Dario is right. If we see WALL-E come out last year, then there wouldn’t be close to half the discussions we have about it now.
[…] so the latter was a good call. (Though if last night’s travesty is anything to go by, it seems animators reeeeaaally love the Panda.) But overall, is it surprising […]
I liked “Happy Feet” too. I find it wonderful that such a derange movie made, like, $400mil worldwide.
What does the year of release have to do with anything? Fact of the matter is a lot (A LOT) of people thought “Wall-E” was one of the best movies of 2008. There is no point arguing about whether it was one of the best movies of 2007 because there is never any possible way of gauging that.
deranged*