Nov 10, 2017

26 animation features submitted for the 2017 Oscar Race

Twenty-six animated features have been submitted for consideration in the Animated Feature Film category of the 90th Academy Awards, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced today.

In nine out of the last ten years, the Academy has rubber stamped a Walt Disney Company-produced animated feature as the category's winner, representing a near-unprecedented streak for a single company's domination of an Oscar category and raising questions about the legitimacy of the category.

This year's submitted films, in alphabetical order, are:

The Big Bad Fox & Other TalesBirdboy: The Forgotten ChildrenThe Boss BabyThe BreadwinnerCaptain Underpants The First Epic MovieCars 3Cinderella the CatCocoDespicable Me 3The Emoji MovieEthel & ErnestFerdinandThe Girl without HandsIn This Corner of the WorldThe Lego Batman MovieThe Lego Ninjago MovieLoving VincentMary and the Witch's FlowerMoomins and the Winter WonderlandMy Entire High School Sinking into the SeaNapping PrincessA Silent VoiceSmurfs: The Lost VillageThe StarSword Art Online: The Movie – Ordinal ScaleWindow Horses: The Poetic Persian Epiphany of Rosie Ming

The Academy points out that even though the films have been submitted doesn't mean they've all qualified yet:

Sixteen or more films must qualify for the maximum of five nominees to be voted, which will certainly happen this year.

There is one less film this year than last year's record-breaking 27 animated feature submissions. The category could have been bigger, and some films that we had anticipated would be submitted were not, among them, Big Fish & Begonia, Have A Nice Day, and Tehran Taboo.

Of the submissions, eleven of the films were produced by major Hollywood studios and fifteen were produced by independent and/or foreign companies.

The Academy has changed the voting process this year, opening up nominations voting in the category to its entire eligible voting membership. The controversial move is widely perceived within the animation community as a way to diminish the influence of the Short Films and Feature Animation Branch (which has exhibited a strong tendency to nominate artistic and challenging films), by adding in more Academy members from other branches, who have a bias towards recognizing mainstream Hollywood productions.