Best Animated Feature - 2016: Zootopia, Moana, Kubo, Zucchini, Red Turtle

[AniNate]

5 hours ago, DamienRoc said:

 

It's not better than Zootopia, though? 

 

Average rating is, which is the only thing I care about

[cannastop]

37 minutes ago, tribefan695 said:

 

Average rating is, which is the only thing I care about

Does anyone else care about it? That's what matters when predicting the academy awards.

[RandomCat]

The Academy tends to pick the highest grossing Animated film that gets nominated.

[Morieris]

Who actually does the nominating? The entire Academy puts forth nominees before the voting or just the Animation branch. 

 

I'm still '...ohkay.' at nominating Boxtrolls over The Lego Movie in 2014, but I guess they were working off technicality instead of story...maybe. 

[cannastop]

7 minutes ago, Morieris said:

Who actually does the nominating? The entire Academy puts forth nominees before the voting or just the Animation branch. 

 

I'm still '...ohkay.' at nominating Boxtrolls over The Lego Movie in 2014, but I guess they were working off technicality instead of story...maybe. 

Just the animation branch picks the nominees. Then the whole academy votes on the winner.

[cannastop]

1 hour ago, RandomJC said:

The Academy tends to pick the highest grossing Animated film that gets nominated.

Not exactly all of the time.

 

List of winners that weren't the highest-grossing nominee:

 

2002: Spirited Away

 

2004: The Incredibles

 

2006: Happy Feet

 

2011: Rango

 

 

What these winners have in common is head-and-shoulders quality over all of the other nominees. For instance, everyone who saw Spirited Away knew that it deserved the Oscar. Will everyone who sees Kubo agree that it's better than Zootopia or Finding Dory, or even Moana? Will they be able to drown out the voters who choose mindlessly?

 

Edit: This might not apply to Happy Feet, but 2006 wasn't a strong year anyways.

Edited August 22, 2016 by cannastop

[RandomCat]

6 minutes ago, cannastop said:

Not exactly all of the time.

 

List of winners that weren't the highest-grossing nominee:

 

2002: Spirited Away

 

2004: The Incredibles

 

2006: Happy Feet

 

2011: Rango

 

 

What these winners have in common is head-and-shoulders quality over all of the other nominees. For instance, everyone who saw Spirited Away knew that it deserved the Oscar. Will everyone who sees Kubo agree that it's better than Zootopia or Finding Dory, or even Moana? Will they be able to drown out the voters who choose mindlessly?

 

Why I said tends to. over 50% of the nominees that win are the highest grossing of the nominated. It's why honest, Dory has the best chance of winning, it's Pixar and it's huge. Zootopia is kind of screwed in that regard, this is a year of great animation, and it's the one with the least noteworthy things about it, and will get overshadowed by Moana from Disney during Oscar pushing (assuming of course, Moana does well critically and financially). Kubo is a very beautiful film, and may be the best of the bunch, but it isn't a clear winner by any stretch. What it does have is Pity. It will be the fifth film by Laika (Including Corpse Bride) to be nominated. The Academy loves to throw bones to repeat noms without wins.

[cannastop]

6 minutes ago, RandomJC said:

 

Why I said tends to. over 50% of the nominees that win are the highest grossing of the nominated. It's why honest, Dory has the best chance of winning, it's Pixar and it's huge. Zootopia is kind of screwed in that regard, this is a year of great animation, and it's the one with the least noteworthy things about it, and will get overshadowed by Moana from Disney during Oscar pushing (assuming of course, Moana does well critically and financially). Kubo is a very beautiful film, and may be the best of the bunch, but it isn't a clear winner by any stretch. What it does have is Pity. It will be the fifth film by Laika (Including Corpse Bride) to be nominated. The Academy loves to throw bones to repeat noms without wins.

I think there's a Rango/Incredibles dynamic to Zootopia in that it has a lot of buzz as a really good movie for a mainstream animated feature. I think it's main competition is Moana.

 

6 minutes ago, RandomJC said:

What it does have is Pity. It will be the fifth film by Laika (Including Corpse Bride) to be nominated. The Academy loves to throw bones to repeat noms without wins.

I'm pretty sure academy voters feel pity for people, not animation studios. That angle is irrelevant, in my opinion.

 

Kubo fits into the role of non-winning Ghibli movies and some independent animated features in that it might be more acclaimed in some specific aspect, but it's still not likely to win.

Edited August 22, 2016 by cannastop

[RandomCat]

2 minutes ago, cannastop said:

I think there's a Rango/Incredibles dynamic to Zootopia in that it has a lot of buzz as a really good movie for a mainstream animated feature. I think it's main competition is Moana.

 

Rango and Incredibles didn't have this kind of competition. Dory has great buzz and very popular. It's Pixar and a good Pixar has the best track record with this category than anything else.

 

2 minutes ago, cannastop said:

I'm pretty sure academy voters feel pity for people, not animation studios. That angle is irrelevant, in my opinion.

 

Kubo fits into the role of non-winning Ghibli movies and some independent animated features in that it might be more acclaimed in some specific aspect, but it's still not likely to win.

 

Academy loves it's pity. and the difference between Ghibli and Laika is that Ghibli has won.

[cannastop]

Awards Circuit posted their predictions for Best Animated Feature:

 

http://www.awardscircuit.com/oscar-predictions/best-animated-feature/

 

And the Predicted Nominees Are:

1. Moana
2. Zootopia
3. Kubo and the Two Strings
4. The Red Turtle
5. Miss Hokusai

Miss Hokusai is a Japanese movie distributed by GKIDS. I had never heard of it before today, and I'm a bit doubtful of its chances. Still, there's a lot of time left to build buzz.

 

The Next Five:

6. Finding Dory

7. Sing

8. Sausage Party

9. April & the Extraordinary World

10. The Secret Life of Pets

 

The Little Prince is not in their top 10, which is understandable, considering its Netflix distribution.

Edited August 22, 2016 by cannastop

[Jason]

1 hour ago, Morieris said:

I'm still '...ohkay.' at nominating Boxtrolls over The Lego Movie in 2014, but I guess they were working off technicality instead of story...maybe. 

 

I can't find out for certain, but I think it's a result of how the nominees are chosen, which is probably by preferential voting. Candidates in preferential voting are typically eliminated by order of weakest first choice support. The Lego Movie would not have any contingent of animation branch members likely to place it as their first choice, unlike any of the other nominees. With regards to Boxtrolls, it's clear there's a portion of the animation branch that are fans of Laika/stop-motion.

 

My original post focused on a different example (Monster's University), but same idea.

[Jason]

2 hours ago, tribefan695 said:

Average rating is, which is the only thing I care about

 

There is no statistically significant difference between the average rating of Zootopia and Kubo. What this means is that the difference in average rating between Zootopia and Kubo is too small to be able to draw any conclusions on which film would have a higher rating from a different sample of the same population.

 

If you would consider the Academy and critics to be different populations, then there's even less reason to believe that they would necessarily be in agreement with critics.

Edited August 22, 2016 by Jason

[AniNate]

I never said Kubo was a lock to win, just that it has the credentials to not draw complaints should it happen

[Jason]

2 hours ago, RandomJC said:

Why I said tends to. over 50% of the nominees that win are the highest grossing of the nominated.

 

The problem with this is that many of those nominees also have the best critical reception, especially among the wide releases. From those winners it's impossible to determine whether box office performance or critical reception is a key predictor of winning.

 

We had this discussion shortly after Dory released, @yjs did a breakdown (full original post worth reading, I quoted in part and there's also more context) of years where there was close competition between films (ie. at least two strong contenders, taking into account both RT and box office).

 

On 6/18/2016 at 0:30 PM, yjs said:

Here are some other notable rivalries from the past.

 

(winners in bold)

2001: Shrek 88% RT/$267M BO vs. Monster's Inc 96% RT/$256M BO

2002: Spirited Away 97% RT/$10M BO vs. Lilo & Stitch 86% RT/$146M BO

2004: The Incredibles 97% RT/$261M BO vs. Shrek 2  88% RT/$441M BO

2006: Happy Feet 75% RT/ $198M BO vs. Cars 74% RT/$244M BO

2008: Wall-E 96% RT/$224M BO vs. Kung Fu Panda 86% RT/$215M BO

2011: Rango 87% RT/$123M BO vs. Kung Fu Panda 2 81% RT/$165M BO vs. Puss in Boots 84% RT/$149M BO

2012: Brave 78% RT/$237M BO vs. Wreck-It Ralph 87% RT/$189M BO

2014: Big Hero 6 89% RT/$223M BO vs. How to Train Your Dragon 2 91% RT/$177M BO.

 

So there've been some obvious wins like Ratatouille, Up, Toy Story 3, Frozen and Inside Out. 

Almost every year people suspect that there will be an indie/ghibli rebel situation happening (predicting the wrong indie winners such as Fantastic Mr. Fox or Coraline in Up's year, The Wind Rises in Frozen's year and Anomalisa in Inside Out's year, for example) which actually very rarely happens. Spirited Away is like the sole exception actually, to win over a major studio's well-received hit (Lilo), but while Lilo was still more of a cute, well-made family film SA already had a Berlin Golden Bear. 

 

When it gets tricky is when there are more than two or even three of those impactful nominees from the major studios (2001, 2004, and maybe 2008 and 2014), or when all the nominees both from major and indie studios are just meh to OK mediocrities. (2006, 2011, 2012).

 

This year is definitely in realm of 2001 and 2004. 

For now I'll still give Zoo a slight edge, similarly following the 2004's scenario. 

 

Spirited Away, The Incredibles, Happy Feet, and Rango all beat nominees with higher box office gross. On the other hand, only Shrek, Brave, and Big Hero 6 beat wide-release nominees with that had higher RT score/average rating but lower box office gross. There does not appear to be any general tendency for films with higher box office gross to win when their competitors are better-received releases from major studios.

[RandomCat]

9 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

The problem with this is that many of those nominees also have the best critical reception, especially among the wide releases. From those winners it's impossible to determine whether box office performance or critical reception is a key predictor of winning.

 

We had this discussion shortly after Dory released, @yjs did a breakdown (full original post worth reading, I quoted in part and there's also more context) of years where there was close competition between films (ie. at least two strong contenders, taking into account both RT and box office).

 

 

Spirited Away, The Incredibles, Happy Feet, and Rango all beat nominees with higher box office gross. On the other hand, only Shrek, Brave, and Big Hero 6 beat wide-release nominees with that had higher RT score/average rating but lower box office gross. There does not appear to be any general tendency for films with higher box office gross to win when their competitors are better-received releases from major studios.

 

Interesting. I'd still put Dory as the most likely to win. My biggest problem with Zoo as a winner is that it's pretty normal. It's a very good movie, but it doesn't feel special, especially in a year of fantastic animation. It doesn't have an indy feel, it isn't unique in it's animation style, it isn't Pixar. And if you're WDAS with two big Oscar pushes, you're more likely to push the more recent candidate than the older one, because Moana will be easier for the voters to remember and judge.

[Jason]

40 minutes ago, RandomJC said:

Interesting. I'd still put Dory as the most likely to win. My biggest problem with Zoo as a winner is that it's pretty normal. It's a very good movie, but it doesn't feel special, especially in a year of fantastic animation. It doesn't have an indy feel, it isn't unique in it's animation style, it isn't Pixar. And if you're WDAS with two big Oscar pushes, you're more likely to push the more recent candidate than the older one, because Moana will be easier for the voters to remember and judge.

 

I'm not sure that Pixar has an inherent advantage either, actually. Brave is the only example of a Pixar film winning where it didn't also have the best critical reception amongst wide releases.

 

I think your other points regarding Zootopia would apply to Dory as well. Unless Moana gets markedly weaker critical reception than Zootopia or Dory, that would be my guess for most likely to win. I still think Zootopia is more likely than Dory, but more because of its originality and social message than the difference in overall critical reception (which is relatively small, and probably a proxy for Academy voting patterns rather than a direct influence).

Edited August 22, 2016 by Jason

[RandomCat]

11 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

I'm not sure that Pixar has an inherent advantage either, actually. Brave is the only example of a Pixar film winning where it didn't also have the best critical reception amongst wide releases.

 

I think your other points regarding Zootopia would apply to Dory as well. Unless Moana gets markedly weaker critical reception than Zootopia or Dory, that would be my guess for most likely to win. I still think Zootopia is more likely than Dory, but more because of its originality and social message than the difference in overall critical reception (which is relatively small, and probably a proxy for Academy voting patterns rather than a direct influence).

 

Pixar feels like it has house advantage. Of course, Dory is 94 to Braves 78. with Zoo being a 98 to Ralph's 87. Dory like Brave also has earned more money to Zoo. But we're in the zone of everything is in the 90% for Best Animated feature, especially since Dory has 25 more reviews on RT than Zootopia, so it's not an equal 1:1 for critical review, so it isn't a fair fight. (that's kind of glancing blow, I'd have to research it more.) Back to Brave/Dory.

 

Brave won, despite being 9 points less on RT than Ralph. Dory is only 4 points less, with both being at very high percentages. So we have a high grossing, well received Pixar movie, the odds lean in it's favor.

 

Granted my normal argument could apply to Dory, since the only thing special is it's Pixar, but Pixar is a high water mark in animation, and naturally has advantages to that. Of course, with the rise of WDAS again we may see the tone shift, but even then, I feel Disney would push Moana harder than Zoo, sadly.

 

For transparency's sake, my horse is The Little Prince, so this is all academic to me, since my favorite won't win. (Though I'd love a Netflix distributed film to win, because it could cause interesting shockwaves in film distribution.)

[yjs]

@RandomJC another thing is that Dory's a sequel. There's been just one sequel that won the award that is Toy Story 3, and not only it was a Best Picture nominee and the #1 BO movie of the year, it was the first movie from the franchise after the category was made. Shrek 2 failed to win despite its mega success and good-to-great reviews, probably because Shrek already won as a predecessor. 

 

While Nemo and Dory have a decade gap and Dory's been received better than Shrek 2 critically, Nemo had already won so the voters might feel they are overcompensating the series instead of welcoming other equally well-deserving originals. 

 

That being said, I agree with @Jason (thanks for a shoutout, btw!) that Moana would be the most likely contender by then, cause after all it's ALWAYS much more about campaigning and the right momentum, how relevant it is THEN when the voting is done, so. Zoo's problem is that it opened way too early in the game (the only winner that opened earlier than Zoo was a February release Rango and that year was one of the weakest years for the category) so by next January all the favored memories will have been muted. 

 

Sing would be a surprise nominee as well if SLoP doesn't sneak in, I'm still very intrigued to see how Sing premieres at TIFF.

[yjs]

but then again Zoo's nature as a social commentary will help it with its staying power and this season is turning out to be another timely #blacklivesmatter kinda season with movies like the Birth of a Nation and Loving and etc. 

[RandomCat]

@yjs I hadn't honestly considered the sequel angle. It is very possible that Dory doesn't get the award for that reason, and that's a huge hit for it. That would pretty much put Moana as the most likely target for Best Animated.

 

I think Zoos biggest problem was it's early release. With a year of fantastic Animated films, it's easy for it to get lost in the shuffle behind more recent fair. 

 

There is enough quality we're spoiled for choice and the winner will surely deserve the nod. I'm more looking forward to this than best pic, honestly.