Oscar Update: The 'Tangled' Un-'Train'-ed 'Story' of the Animated Race

This weekend sees the release of DreamWorks’s Megamind and just before Thanksgiving on November 24 Disney will debut Tangled. With these two releases the Oscar race for Best Animated Feature film will be in full swing with only Sony Classics’s The Illusionist as the last major contender left to enter the fray, and by that time it’s going to be a wild race to the top.

This is a great year for animated films and this is a race that could be more political (at least political in terms of Oscar and industry “political”) than we’ve seen in quite some time. Let’s take a closer look.

We’ll begin with DreamWorks and Paramount’s How to Train Your Dragon, which was released on March 26, and let’s be honest, this wasn’t what we typically expect from a DreamWorks Animation picture. This wasn’t along the lines of the pop-culture obsessed Shrek and was even a step above Kung Fu Panda, the 2008 film that proved the studio wasn’t simply a poop-joke away from becoming obsolete.

How to Train Your Dragon had heart instead of just a desire to tell half-baked jokes and the animation was artisitic, minimalistic and, at times, breath-taking. I was fortunate enough to see it in 2D, though there are even champions out there that loved it in 3D, many citing the seashore dragon flight, weaving in and around the rocks as one of the film’s highlights. Dragon went on to make over $217 million domestically and nearly $500 million worldwide. It’s easily one of this year’s top contenders for Best Animated feature.

The next big contender (and probably top contender) is obviously Disney and Pixar’s Toy Story 3. This is also where the discussion gets a little tricky and a little “political.” The Best Animated Feature Oscar was instituted in 2001, the year Shrek beat out Pixar’s Monsters, Inc. for the award. In the eight years since that time six Pixar films have been released and six Pixar films have been nominated for Best Animated Feature and five of those six won, Cars being the lone film to lose out to Happy Feet in 2006. Pixar films have won the last three years in a row, giving the animated studio something of a monopoly on the award. Can such history have an effect on Toy Story 3‘s ability to make it four years in a row?

In the past three years the only film that really stood much of a chance against any of the Pixar films winning Best Animated Feature was Kung Fu Panda in 2008, but that’s only because it performed so well at the box-office and performed something of a controversial sweep at that year’s Annie Awards. No one really expected it to beat WALL•E, but I’m just covering all bases. Last year Up ended up winning, but it also became the second animated film to ever be nominated for Best Picture, an honor some feel is best left to live-action films alone seeing how animated films have their own category, but I don’t think there is an Oscar prognosticator out there that doesn’t have Toy Story 3 as one of their predicted ten Best Picture nominees, which is where the discussion continues.

After amassing over $1 billion in worldwide box-office receipts, Toy Story 3 is one of the highest grossing films of all-time (#9 domestically and #5 worldwide). It’s the #2 animated film domestically behind Shrek 2 and #1 animated film worldwide. It has a 99% rating at RottenTomatoes making it the best reviewed film in wide release this year, but right there at #2 is How to Train Your Dragon. Is it possible Toy Story 3 could be nominated for Best Picture and Best Animated Feature and still not take home the Best Animated Oscar? Is it possible being nominated for Best Picture will be its reward?

Obviously How to Train Your Dragon is the current film best positioned to beat out Toy Story 3 at the moment, but there are other films out there that could enter the debate.

The only film that comes to mind of those that have already been released that should even be considered part of the conversation is Universal’s July release, Despicable Me. A combination of good timing, good reviews and good word of mouth propelled the film to six straight weeks in the box-office top ten and a domestic haul of almost $250 million. I find it unlikely it will be able to take home the Oscar, but it should definitely remain part of the nomination chatter.

As for those films yet to be released, two stand out to me, but you are probably thinking of three at this time.

The one you’re probably thinking of that I have already seen and am ready to outright dismiss is this weekend’s release Megamind. Critics are currently split on the film and I expect that will continue as reviews continue to come in. My opinion is to tell you this is not a good film by any stretch. It feels like a cheap Monsters vs. Aliens knock-off that’s trying to be The Incredibles and in terms of the bad guy turned good, it’s already been bested by Despicable Me. If my opinion is worth anything, count it out right now.

As for the two that stand a serious chance, Disney has an absolute winner with Tangled. The trailers don’t do this film justice (although the new TV spots are a drastic improvement) and the reasoning is simple, Disney is trying to attract both a male and female audience, scared that if they show too much of Rapunzel the boys will be turned off. Forget about all of that, Tangled returns Disney to their animated roots. This is the first CG movie from Disney Animation that feels like classic Disney. I loved this film, it’s a ton of fun and filled with adventure, the perfect mix of villainy and heroism, the animal sidekicks are hilarious and the artistry (the lantern scene is virtually perfect) is top notch. Tangled is a true contender. Is it good enough to beat out Dragon and Toy Story? Eh, that’s a tough battle.

The other film that I can’t quite decide exactly what we’re looking at here is Sony Classics’s The Illusionist, something of an animated art house wild card. I saw the film at TIFF and enjoyed it, but it surprised me at just how sorrowful the story is. The best comparison I can think of are two other Sony Classics releases, Persepolis and Sylvain Chomet’s previous animated Oscar nominee The Triplets of Belleville. Both films were respected, but neither won the top prize, Persepolis lost to Ratatouille and Triplets lost to The Incredibles. Will Pixar again trump Sony Classics? Will The Illusionist even be nominated? Will it even be released? (For more on that last question click here.)

Right now I have a list of four films up for contention:

Toy Story 3
How to Train Your Dragon
Tangled
The Illusionist

Unfortunately, unless there are 16 or more animated films in contention, only three receive nominations. Last week I posted a list made by Steve Pond at The Wrap discussing this very dilemma. He has 14 films listed he’s quite certain will make up the field and the deadline for submitting entry forms and supporting materials to the Academy was this past Monday, November 1, which means we should have our first list of contenders very soon. Last year the announcement was made on November 11.

Whether the number of nominees is three or five, I still maintain the four films above are the top contenders. Should the total grow to five nominees I’d say Despicable Me becomes my fifth.

As a reminder, here is the list of 14 suspected contenders for Best Animated Feature this year with links to each either here on RopeofSilicon.com or over at IMDb for those I don’t have in my database.