Netflix triumphs all over the place at the 49th Annie Awards

by Nathaniel R

The 49th annual Annie Awards honoring animation in features, shorts, and television were held last night. While Raya and the Last Dragon led the nominations it went home empty-handed. The night's Best Animated Feature winner was Netflix and Sony's The Mitchells vs The Machines which took home 8 Annies in total. The Annie winner doesn't always line up with Oscar but it might. Disney's Encanto, which many pundits including us are predicting for the Oscar win, only won three prizes: Music, Character Animation, and Storyboarding. On the television side of the prizes, Netflix's Arcane was totally dominant winning an amazing nine trophies, a clean sweep of its nominations. Full list of winners is after the jump...

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Oscar Volley: Sobbing and Fuming at the "Best Animated Feature" nominees

Team Experience will be covering the various Oscar categories in the lead up to Oscar night. Here's Tim Brayton, Cláudio Alves, and Nathaniel R...

TIM BRAYTON: Hello Nathaniel and Cláudio! I'm thrilled to have the chance to discuss this year's slate of nominees for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars with you - animation is, I think it's fair to say, the most important form of filmmaking to me, and it's always fun to share it. Whether these exact five films represent animation at its peak, well, we'll just have to get into that as we go.

A quick recap for all of us and those of you reading, here are the five nominees: Encanto, a CGI feature produced by Walt Disney Animation; Raya and the Last Dragon, a CGI feature produced by Walt Disney Animation; Luca, a CGI feature produced by Pixar Animation Studios and distributed by their corporate owners, the Walt Disney Company; The Mitchells vs the Machines, a CGI feature produced by Sony Animation, who sold it off to Netflix. And then literally on the other side of the world, Flee, a Danish documentary about politics and identity, largely consisting of interviews that were animated in a cartoony 2D style by Sun Creature Studio. So my point, obviously, is that this isn't exactly the most stylistically or industrially diverse set of nominees this category has ever produced...

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ADG & ACE winners spread the wealth

by Nathaniel R

The Art Directors Guild and the American Cinema Editors Guild announced their winners last night. The results indicate support for multiple films vying for Best Picture with Encanto (not a Best Picture nominee) the only film to win at both ceremonies last night. King Richard made news winning the Drama Editing prize over presumedly stronger Best Picture hopefuls like Dune and Power of the Dog but who knows what Oscar might choose. Statistically, believe it or not, this win is not necessarily a big plus in King Richard's column (other than to be recognized which if of course wonderful on its own!). AMPAS has a differnet voting body and they often choose differently in the editing category.  

Winners and commentary after the jump for both guilds after the jump...

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Hot Links and Leftovers

• Vulture Allison Wilmore makes a good case that Don't Look Up is going to win Best Picture (uh-oh)
• The Daily Beast great far ranging interview with Steven Soderbergh - very exciting quote on the third Magic Mike movie "It’s as close to a full-blown musical as I’m ever going to get." And yes he also talks about superhero movies which all the A list directors are required to talk about now in interviews (sigh)
• Vogue "2022 Hollywood Portfolio" features lots of Oscar hopefuls and also some wildcards having a good year. Alana Haim, Simu Liu, Aunjanue Ellis, Dakota Johnson, Rachel Zegler, Dami Judi Dench, Jodie Comer, etc...

Razzie nominations, Plaza Suite, Mothering Sunday, American Born Chinese and more after the jump...

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Oscar Volley: Is Best Animated Feature already wrapped up?

Continuing our Oscar Volley series at The Film Experience. Abe Friedtanzer and Timothy Lyons on Best Animated Feature

My Sunny Maad, Belle, and Poupelle are all hoping to interrupt the Disney party in Best Animated Feature

ABE FRIEDTANZER: Most years after the Oscar nominations come out I have to play catch up on everything I've missed. That's not the case in a second consecutive season where the Oscars are later in the calendar. I have caught most of the contenders here. The mainstream American studio options are actually all great but of course I'd love to see some international choices make the cut. Belle seems like a decent bet to crack the list, and while it's a terrific film, I want to champion another Japanese movie, Poupelle of Chimney Town. I do worry that it's too under-the-radar to get enough votes, but it was the most visually striking animation I saw all year. I was also impressed by My Sunny Maad, which, like the much buzzier Flee, is about Afghanistan but is a very different experience. Maad has only been noticed by the Golden Globes, so I'm not sure what kind of buzz it has. What have you seen that you'd love to see nominated...

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