No Anime at the Oscars?

Date: 2007 January 11 22:12

Posted by Jeremy

Paprika's chances of an Oscar nomination hurt by disqualification of another movie!

Full Story

Okay, good news and bad news. The good news is that Paprika, the latest thriller from Perfect Blue director Satoshi Kon, is still one of several animated films being considered for a nomination for Best Animated Feature Film at this year's Academy Awards (aka the Oscars). The bad news is that is that it might not get a nod, because right now there are only three nomination spots available for the award.

The low number comes from the recent disqualification of Arthur and the Invisibles. The film is a combination of live action and CGI animation, the latter of which makes up less than 75% of its total running time. And according to the rules of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), for a film to be eligible for Best Animated Feature it must be more than 75% animated.

Also according to the rules, there must be sixteen or more movies eligible for there to be five nominations. The disqualification of Arthur and the Invisibles drops the number to fifteen, meaning now only three films can be receive nominations. And there must be at least eight movies eligible for the award to even be given out. Man, those rules are strict.

Luckily for Paprika, it's one of fifteen remaining films still in the running for Oscar nods. But it’s also facing some big competition, as the other fourteen are Cars, Ice Age: The Meltdown, Happy Feet, Over the Hedge, The Ant Bully, Barnyard, Curious George, Everyone's Hero, Flushed Away, Monster House, Open Season, Renaissance, A Scanner Darkly and The Wild. The nominations will be announced on January 23, with the Academy Awards to air on February 25.

Ever since Spirited Away won the Best Animated Feature award in 2002, fans have anxiously awaited each to see if another anime film would once again take the gold. However, their hopes have been for naught. Tokyo Godfathers, also directed by Kon, had been eligible for a nomination but never received one, and while Howl's Moving Castle was nominated last year, it lost to Wallace and Grommit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. All anime fans can do at this point is hope that Paprika still receives one of the three nomination spots, that another animated film becomes eligible to increase the number of nominations, and best of all, win the award.