Ranking the Best Animated Feature Winners - From Worst to Best

Another Oscar ceremony has passed and another animated film has been crowned as the best of the year. Frozen was awarded the Best Animated Feature prize, marking the first win for Walt Disney Animation Studios in that category. But, how does it compare to the previous winners? Let's take a look at the films that have won in this category since its inception in 2002.

Frozen Wins Two Oscars! Mr. Hublot and Gravity Also Take Home Awards

(L-R) Producer Peter del Vecho, and directors Jennifer Lee and Chris Buck,
accepting the Best Animated Feature Oscar on Sunday night.

It's been a big few days for Frozen: it's just became only the second animated film ever to pass a billion dollars at the worldwide box-office, and, immediately after that news, it won two Academy Awards at Sunday's Oscars! More below.

Frozen Takes Home WDAS' First Golden Globe for Best Animated Feature

It's not a shocker, but it's extremely well deserved nonetheless: last night at the 71st Golden Globe Awards, Walt Disney Animation Studios' acclaimed hit, Frozen, took home the statue for Best Animated Feature, making it the first WDAS film to do so since the award's inception seven years ago.

66th Annual British Academy Film Awards Predictions

Tonight's the biggest night of the year for British film, and quite a prestigious one for film in general. From 9 PM (GMT) on BBC1, the 66th annual British Academy Film Awards will take place - hosted by Stephen Fry - as BAFTA honour the best in film of the last year. As such, it's time for A113Animation to offer up our predictions (if you're interested in our own picks, check out the nominations for the 3rd annual A113Animation Awards).

How it works with our predictions is that the films I think should win are in bold, but the films that I think probably will win are underlined. Check them out, starting with animation, of course, below. If no prediction is offered, it's because it's a category I'm clueless about/haven't seen any of the nominees for, and the nominees are listed purely for informative purposes. The results will be highlighted in gold as and when they occur.

Oscars 2013: Munir's Best Animated Feature Predictions

By Munir Abedrabbo.

With awards season in full swing, it’s always customary to start predicting the winners, and, while most predictions centre around the Best Picture category, the Best Animated Feature category is just as important for animation lovers. 2012 brought a strong slate of animated films and, more importantly, it was a year that was not dominated by CGI features – offering a nice variety of mediums to help audiences appreciate the diversity and beauty of animation. Most awards institutions have nominated more or less the same candidates, with the odd exception here or there (The Pirates! snubbed from the BAFTAs; ParaNorman replaced by Hotel Transylvania at the Golden Globes), but now that we have the five nominees for the Oscars, I think it’s time to evaluate each nominee’s pros, cons and chances of winning the prestigious award.

So It Has Begun: First Round of For Your Consideration Ads

Yes, it is that time of year again. It has its detractors, but I happen to think Awards season is pretty exciting! So, in a bid to get their films nominates for as many awards (well, mainly Oscars) as possible, studios have begun rolling out For Your Consideration ads - and we've got some cool animation ones so far.

21 Animated Features Submitted for Oscar Consideration

Apologies for the mini-hiatus, guys, I've been in London watching Monsters, Inc. 3D (review up later)! But, it's back to business as usual, with this exciting news from Friday: the list of the 21 animated feature films that have been submitted to the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences for consideration for the Oscar for Best Animated Feature have been revealed.

Included among the running are likely favourites Brave, Wreck-It Ralph and ParaNorman. Check out the full list, with studios (where known), after the jump break - with links to trailers and reviews where appropriate:

Oscar Results - Rango and Morris Lessmore Take Home Awards

Last night was the 84th Annual Academy Awards ceremony, emanating from the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, California, celebrating the greatest achievements in cinema over the past 12 months.

Taking home the most prolific awards of the night, including Best Picture, Best Director (Michel Hazanavicius) and Best Actor (Jean Dujardin), was, unsurprisingly, The Artist. The french, black-and-white, silent film drew with Martin Scorsese's Hugo for total number of awards won, at 5 each. However, Hugo took home the more technical awards, including Art Direction, Cinematography and Visual Effects.

In terms of animation, the Gore Verbinski directed western flick, Rango, took home the award for Best Animated Feature, beating out A Cat in Paris, Chico and Rita, Kung Fu Panda 2 and Puss in Boots. Upon winning the award, Verbinski (pictured top with the statue) said:

"Someone asked me if this film was for kids. I don’t know, but it was certainly created by a bunch of grown-ups acting like children."

The Best Animated Short Film award was this year given to The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, by Shreveport based Moonbot Studios. Directors William Joyce and Brandon Oldenburg (pictured above) were on hand to accept the honour. It's a huge honour and great sign of recognition for the studio's first short film; read more on Moonbot's website.

Bret McKenzie also took home the Best Original Song award for Man or Muppet, it's just a shame The Muppets didn't snag more nominations.

Nonetheless, congratulations to all involved in all of the films that won and those nominated. Read the full list of winners here.

Shrek: Once Upon A Time

No matter what you make of the sequels, Shrek, as a film and indeed a franchise, is one of the most important and noteworthy sagas in animation history; the 2001 original did, after all, win the first Oscar for Best Animated Feature. Tonight, BBC Three (this's really only applicable if you're in the UK) has a night of Shrek in store. Shrek the Halls is on right now, to be followed by the original film, however, the point of this post is what starts at 9. A documentary based upon the influence of Shrek, entitled Shrek: Once Upon A Time, narrated by David Tennant. It sounds great, after all, the Pixar: 25 Magic Moments documentary that BBC produced recently was great! I would suggest catching it if you can.

Golden Globe Nominations Revealed

The nominations for the 69th Annual Golden Globes Awards have been revealed today, the full list of nominations and categories can be viewed here.

In terms of animation, the nominations for the Golden Globe for Best Animated Feature are:

• THE ADVENTURES OF TINTIN
  Paramount Pictures/Columbia Pictures/ Hemisphere Capital/Amblin Entertainment/Wingnut Films Production/ Kennedy/Marshall Production A Steven Spielberg Film; Paramount Pictures and Columbia Pictures
• ARTHUR CHRISTMASColumbia Pictures & Sony Pictures Animation; Sony Pictures Releasing International
• CARS 2
  Walt Disney Pictures, Pixar Animation Studios; Walt Disney Pictures
• PUSS IN BOOTSDreamWorks Animation; Paramount Pictures
• RANGO
  Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies present A Blind Wink / GK Films Production; Paramount Pictures

It's somewhat strange to me that Puss in Boots and Arthur Christmas (or even Cars 2, due it's rather negative reviews) were nominated, whereas Kung Fu Panda 2 - definitely one of the best films of the year - was omitted.

Nonetheless, it is a very solid field this year, and it seems likely to me that the HFPA will pick either Tintin or Rango. However, we'll have to wait until January 15 to find out.

Via Big Screen Animation.

At DreamWorks, The Dream Works

DreamWorks Animation Studios is a name and a company that will likely garner mixed responses. Its films are often accused of being cheesier, cheaper and more rushed; it’s always playing second fiddle to Pixar. Then again, that’s nothing to be ashamed of. Pixar is the greatest animation studio of the past few decades; it took over when Disney faltered, as the crème de la crème of animation. Narrowly following this is a hard act, yet one DreamWorks seems to have managed over the years, with improvements hitting us all the time.

Also, let us not forget that DreamWorks were awarded the very first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature back in 2001, for Shrek, which still remains one of their finest films, trumping Pixar’s Monsters, Inc. in the process – not an easy feat.

So, how did DreamWorks get this reputation for being a far cruder, far less emotionally poignant, wannabe version of Pixar? To be honest, I don’t think they have this reputation anymore, but the main reason is likely the way they rush a lot of their films, in the past anyway. There are a few DreamWorks films that I love on par with any other film – Pixar, animated or otherwise –, those being Shrek, How to Train Your Dragon and Kung Fu Panda 2; they were witty, smart, funny and, more importantly, genuinely touching and heart warming. However, we also have a series of, maybe not great, but solidly fun and entertaining films, such as Monsters vs. Aliens and Megamind. The problem, however, with their reputation lies in the large portion of their films that are just mediocre filler.

A lot of the DreamWorks canon is unmemorable, dull, crude or just plain pointless; Bee Movie, Shark Tale, Over the Hedge and Shrek the Third are four films that I just consider plain bad, they were cringe worthily terrible, the characters felt unformed, the scripts felt unfinished and the animation looked unpolished. Similarly, films like Madagascar and Shrek 4 felt like they had potential and, while they were fun, they felt like DreamWorks, in their desire to make money, had rushed the production, loaded them full of stupid pop-culture gags and references and crude “edgy” humour.

The effect on the studio of its CEO, former Disney head honcho, Jeffrey Katzenberg, usually provides some form of consternation for animation aficionados. Katzenberg has a reputation for being unreasonable and micromanaging, insisting on 'edge', and making it difficult to make a resonant, warm film. However, let us not forget that he is one of the largest factors behind the Disney Renaissance, without which, Disney may not be what it is today still, it may have not been able to buy Pixar and the entire landscape of animation history would be different. Jeff Katzenberg is an animation visionary and without him, DreamWorks wouldn't be what it is, for good and bad; yes we can attribute blame to him, but we must also attribute rapturuous acclaim.

But, there is no arguing, DreamWorks is a fantastic studio. Specifically in recent years, the studio has been, more and more, refining their films, fine tuning the story and its characters and focusing on genuine emotions, and it shows. Over the last two years, DreamWorks have released two of my favourite animated films of all time: How to Train Your Dragon and Kung Fu Panda 2. Both were definitely ‘Pixar quality’, and can easily be considered some of the best films in recent memory. The studio is riding a curve upwards at the moment, they are on a major roll, Puss in Boots (review up this weekend) is supposed to be a pretty solid and entertaining film from the studio, and films like The Croods sound like they’ll be a great way to keep the current tradition going.

DreamWorks produce, more so now than ever, warm, touching, very funny and witty animated films that the whole family can truly enjoy. They are the second best animation studio around, and, particularly after the last couple of years, it should be very proud of that.

National Board of Review Recognises Rango

The National Board of Review, a collection of top film experts, have announced their annual awards, with Martin Scorsese's critically acclaimed Hugo scooping the top prize of Best Film. However, in the animation category, the NBR recognised Nickelodeon Movies and ILM's Rango, starring Johnny Depp, which is a heavy favourite going into award season due to its wit and satire.

Rango really was a fun and clever film, whilst not in my opinion the best of the year, it's still a good choice that may very well be repeated by the Academy come February.

Annie Award Nominations Revealed

ASIFA-Hollywood have revealed the nominations for the 39th Annual Annie Awards, 'Animation's Highest Honor' will be presented on February 4, 2012 and the extensive slate of nominations were released online today.

The top prize, the Annie Award for Best Animated Feature, this year has a whopping 10 nominations, including my personal favourites, The Adventures of Tintin and Kung Fu Panda 2. The full list of nominations for the award can be viewed below:

Best Animated Feature

• A Cat in Paris – Folimage
• Arrugas (Wrinkles) - Perro Verde Films, S.L.
• Arthur Christmas – Sony Pictures Animation, Aardman Animations (my review)
• Cars 2 – Pixar Animation Studios (my review)
• Chico & Rita – Chico & Rita Distribution Limited
• Kung Fu Panda 2 – DreamWorks Animation (my review)
• Puss In Boots – DreamWorks Animation
• Rango – Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies present A Blind Wink/GK Films Production (my review)
• Rio – Blue Sky Studios (my review)
• Tintin – Amblin Entertainment, Wingnut Films and Kennedy/Marshall (my review)

There seems to be a large portion of Individual Achievement Awards for Disney's Winnie the Pooh (my review) and DreamWorks' Kung Fu Panda 2 and Puss in Boots - some absolutely gorgeous films. Obviously, as DreamWorks is one of the main sponsors of ASIFA-Hollywood, there's always the accusation of unfairness - especially due to the shut out of Toy Story 3 last year and the lack of nominations for Cars 2 this year, following the very public pulling out of the studio's support for the awards -, but Kung Fu Panda 2 was brilliant, and I'd hate to see a repeat of last year, where How to Train Your Dragon's monumentous wins were overshadowed by screams of fowl-play.

Read the full list of nominations here.

Also, rememeber to vote in the poll to the right, for your favourite animated film of the year, to decide The People's Favourite A113Animation Award.

Cars 2 For Your Consideration Campaign Begins

As awards season rapidly approaches, Disney and Pixar begin the promoting of the Emeryville studio's latest feature with the above For Your Consideration Oscar adverts. Cars 2 is being promoted for consideration in the categories of Best Animated Feature, Best Song and Best Score.

However, due to the outpouring of negative and mixed reviews for Cars 2, Pixar face an uphill battle for the first time ever, just to get nominated; especially against such firm competition this year as Kung Fu Panda 2, Tintin, Rio and more. Personally, I thought Cars 2 was very, very good and was reviewed very unjustly, however, it is hard from Pixar's strongest and the studio that have won the prestigious Best Animated Feature Oscar consecutively for the past 4 years, will struggle to win, if, of course, they get the nomination.

First Happy Feet 2 Trailer

Today we've got our first look at the sequel to the 2006 Academy Award Winning and utterly amazing animated film, Happy Feet. Happy Feet 2 is due in cinemas in November, the trailer - while not introducing anything particularly new - shows the comedy and music that made the first film such a hit. I for one can't wait to see more from Happy Feet 2.

Hey Now, You're Still an All Star!

As of Wendesday of this week (18/05/11), arguably one of the best animated films of all time and certainly one of the best DreamWorks' films, Shrek, is 10 years old. First released in North America on May 18, 2001, the film was the beginning of the signature DreamWorks franchise, spawning 3 sequels and with a spin-off (Puss in Boots) coming out later this year and grossed nearly $3 billion worldwide across all of the films. The original Shrek, now 10 years old, won the very first Best Animated Feature Academy Award, beating out even Pixar's fantastic Monsters, Inc.

Whilst DreamWorks have not always consistently provided such entertainment or depth; Shrek was a fantastic film and, even ten years on, retains its brilliance.

2011 Annie Awards, How to Train Your Dragon wins 10, Toy Story 3 Shut Out

Controversy is certain to surround the 2011 Annie Awards and it may well be a year that lives in infamy, mere months after Disney and Pixar publicly withdrew support for the Annie Awards and for ASIFA, due to allegedly unfair voting process, - and the fact that DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg, buys each new DreamWorks member of staff an ASIFA Hollywood membership, automatically giving any decent DreamWorks film an edge - and in a similar vein to 2008 (when WALL E was shut out in favour of Kung Fu Panda), Toy Story 3 was COMPLETELY shut out.

While this was to be expected as Toy Story 3 was not officially submitted and only received 3 nominations, it's still disappointing. On the other hand, DreamWorks' How to Train Your Dragon swept the awards and won a gigantic 10, including all of the individual achievement awards that Toy Story 3 wasn't even nominated for!

Perhaps most importantly, How to Train Your Dragon won the Best Animated Feature Award, beating out Despicable Me, Tangled, The Illusionist and, of course, Toy Story 3. Congratulations to How to Train Your Dragon, it's certainly a fantastic film and one of my favourite animated films of all time and, as previously stated, at this point it seems pretty certain that Toy Story 3 is going to win the Best Animated Film Oscar, so it's nice to see HTTYD get some recognition. However, the fact that it won 10 awards and (the Best Picture nominated) Toy Story 3 won none, is only going to raise questions and controversy. As we saw in 2008 with Kung Fu Panda, I feel that the controversy is going to overshadow the achievements of How to Train Your Dragon.

Congrats to DreamWorks and consolidation to Pixar (who did manage to scoop the Best Animated Short Subject award for Day & Night, along with Brad Bird, Eric Goldberg, Matt Groening winning the Winsor McCay Award), but it's certain that ASIFA needs to have a close look at their process in the near future.

I'm not shocked at this, just disappointed.

Full list of awards and recipients here.

Thoughts?

Oscar Predictions

Since the nominations for the 83rd Annual Academy Awards have been revealed, I thought it would be a good idea to give my predictions for them. The films I want to win are in bold, the films I think will win are underlined. Categories with no bold or underlined entries means I haven't seen any of the films nominated.

Best Picture
'Black Swan'
'The Fighter'
'Inception'
'The Kids Are All Right'
'The King’s Speech'
'127 Hours'
'The Social Network'
'Toy Story 3'
'True Grit'
'Winter’s Bone'

Best Director
Darren Aronofsky, 'Black Swan'
David O. Russell, 'The Fighter'
Tom Hooper, 'The King's Speech'
David Fincher, 'The Social Network'
Joel and Ethan Coen, 'True Grit'

Best Actor
Javier Bardem, 'Biutiful'
Jeff Bridges, 'True Grit'
Jesse Eisenberg, 'The Social Network'
Colin Firth, 'The King's Speech'
James Franco, '127 Hours'

Best Actress
Annette Bening, 'The Kids Are All Right'
Nicole Kidman, 'Rabbit Hole'
Jennifer Lawrence, 'Winter's Bone'
Natalie Portman, 'Black Swan'
Michelle Williams, 'Blue Valentine'

Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale, 'The Fighter'
John Hawkes, 'Winter's Bone'
Jeremy Renner, 'The Town'
Mark Ruffalo, 'The Kids Are All Right'
Geoffrey Rush, 'The King's Speech'

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams, 'The Fighter'
Helena Bonham Carter, 'The King's Speech'
Melissa Leo, 'The Fighter'
Hailee Steinfeld, 'True Grit'
Jacki Weaver, 'Animal Kingdom'

Best Animated Feature Film
'How to Train Your Dragon'
'Illusionist'
'Toy Story 3'

Best Foreign Film
Mexico - 'Biutiful'
Greece - 'Dogtooth'
Denmark - 'In a Better World'
Canada - 'Incendies'
Algeria - 'Outside the law'

Best Original Screenplay
'Another Year'
'The Fighter'
'Inception'
'The Kids Are All Right'
'The King's Speech'

Best Adapted Screenplay
'127 Hours'
'The Social Network'
'Toy Story 3'
'True Grit'
'Winter's Bone'

Best Art Direction
'Alice in Wonderland'
'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I'
'Inception'
'The King's Speech'
'True Grit'

Best Costume Design
'Alice in Wonderland'
'I Am Love'
'The King's Speech'
'The Tempest'
'True Grit'

Best Original Song
'Coming Home' - 'Country Strong'
'I See the Light' - 'Tangled'
'If I Rise' - '127 Hours'
'We Belong Together' - 'Toy Story 3'

Best Original Score
'How to Train Your Dragon' John Powell
'Inception' Hans Zimmer
'The King's Speech' Alexandre Desplat
'127 Hours' A.R. Rahman
'The Social Network' Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

Best Documentary
'Exit Through the Gift Shop'
'Gasland'
'Inside Job'
'Restrepo'
'Waste Land'

Best Film Editing
'Black Swan'
'The Fighter'
'The Kings Speech'
'127 Hours'
'The Social Network'

Best Makeup
'Barney's Version'
'The Way Back'
'The Wolfman'

Best Sound Editing
'Inception'
'Toy Story 3'
'TRON: Legacy'
'True Grit'
'Unstoppable'

Best Sound Mixing
'Inception'
'The King's Speech'
'Salt'
'The Social Network'
'True Grit'

Best Visual Effects
'Alice in Wonderland'
'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1'
'Hereafter'
'Inception'
'Iron Man 2'

Best Documentary (Short Subject)
'Killing in the Name'
'Poster Girl'
'Strangers No More'
'Sun Comes Up'
'The Warriors of Qiugang'

Best Visual Short Film (Animated)
'Day & Night'
'The Gruffalo'
'Let's Pollute'
'The Lost Thing'
'Madagascar, carnet de voyage (Madagascar, a Journey Diary)'

Best Short Film (Live Action)
'The Confession'
'The Crush'
'God of Love'
'Na Wewe'
'Wish 143'

It's certainly a packed show this year, I'm personally predicting that the films that will pick up the most Oscars are The King's Speech, The Social Network, Toy Story 3 and Inception. I'm personally pulling for Toy Story 3 and Inception. Also... what?... no Best Director nomination for Christopher Nolan or Lee Unkrich, they better be saving Chris Nolan's nomination for the Dark Knight Rises! 

The awards are set to take place on February 27th.

Oscar Nominations Revealed: 5 Nominations for Toy Story 3, 2 for How to Train Your Dragon

Last night, the nominations for the 83rd Annual Academy Awards were revealed and it was a big night for animated films.

The nominations for Best Animated Feature Film (note. there are 3 this year, not 5) are:

• How to Train Your Dragon - Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois
• The Illusionist - Sylvain Chomet
• Toy Story 3 - Lee Unkrich

Whilst I haven't seen the Illusionist, it is said to be fantastic and I know for a fact that Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon are. In light of this, How to Train Your Dragon was also nominated for Best Original Score, and Toy Story 3 was nominated for another 4 awards! These are:

• Adapted Screenplay (Screenplay by Michael Arndt. Story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich)

• Original Song ("We Belong Together"; music and lyrics by Randy Newman)

• Sound Editing (Tom Myers and Michael Silvers)

And... Wait for it...

• Best Picture - Darla K. Anderson

Needless to say, this is a fantastic achievement for the Pixar crew, not only being nominated, but being the second Pixar film in a row - and the third animated film ever, after Beauty and the Beast and Up - to be nominated for Best Picture. Congrats to the whole Pixar team on this monumental achievement and the best of luck.

Also of note, Teddy Newton's Toy Story 3 attached Short Film, Day & Night, is nominated for Best Animated Short Film.

Congrats to everyone nominated for all awards, best of luck to Toy Story 3 in the Best Picture category and stay tuned to see how things play out. The awards are on February, 27th.

BAFTA Nominations

The nominations for the 2011 BAFTA Awards were announced yesterday and the nominations for Best Animated Film are as follows:

• Despicable Me - Chris Renaud, Pierre Coffin
• How to Train Your Dragon - Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois
• Toy Story 3 - Lee Unkrich

In addition, Toy Story 3 has been nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay and Special Visual Effects.

The awards are due to take place on February 13th at the Royal Opera House. You can view all nominees here.