LOOK! A Bunch Of Charts

So when I was doing the reading last week, I got to thinking "Wow the Academy is super America-centric and also kind of nonsense, especially regarding animation. Like I know the Academy Awards are just a marketing tool but the animation category is ridiculous. I mean SERIOUSLY,  why did Big Hero 6 win, WHEN LITERALLY EVERY OTHER FILM ON THE BALLOT WAS BETTER?!?!?"... So long story short I stayed up until 2:30 making charts about it.






Comments

  1. jasonhSeptember 10, 2018 at 7:20 AM

    Tom, amazing graphs and great point! The world is exploding with great animation and the latest blockbusters from the major studios sucks up all the oxygen!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Elaine HortonSeptember 10, 2018 at 8:58 AM

    These are great! To add to this, I remember reading this article a couple years ago (https://www.cartoonbrew.com/award-season-focus/proof-that-oscar-voters-are-clueless-about-animation-109456.html) about how the reason why the Oscar for animation is so heavily skewed towards Pixar/the highest grossing feature is because most of the academy members don't actually watch all the films that were nominated. There's links to the full interviews with the voters, too, and it seems like most of them make decisions based on what their kids liked the best. The majority of them say they didn't even watch the animated shorts that year (this is the year that Big Hero 6 and Feast won.)

    One of them also says "If I was just voting for animation, I’d have gone with Boxtrolls. But since you have to consider everything, I went with Big Hero 6" - which also brings up the question of what the criteria for picking best animated film is or should be, in terms of technical/artistic achievement or content/story? Not that these interviews give me any confidence there's any method to the madness, but y'know, maybe there should be??

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. jasonhSeptember 12, 2018 at 7:31 AM

      Warning this is political and not related to animation:
      that makes me think how clear criteria for decision making can be so important:
      https://slate.com/culture/2018/09/john-oliver-florida-voting-last-week-tonight.html

      Delete
  3. UnknownSeptember 10, 2018 at 12:18 PM

    I'll be honest in saying that anything I know about animation has previously been through Disney and Pixar. I love How to Train Your Dragon and I put that under my favorite animated film on the list in class, but I wonder if I had more exposure to this world of animation if it would even be on my radar. My lack of experience with the world of animation is seriously concerning, but we are shaped by the culture we live in and that says that Disney and Pixar are the ones to watch and the ones that deserve all the awards. I'm hoping the class might help me with this. Btw these are fantastic charts, Thomas.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. jasonhSeptember 12, 2018 at 7:34 AM

      Big and small I love them all! Well, not all, but you know what I'm saying

      Delete
  4. ReneeSeptember 10, 2018 at 3:25 PM

    I've always thought that animation wasn't given enough time or consideration in award ceremonies. I'd never thought that perhaps the people judging the films wouldn't even have criteria for judging them. That's just...ridiculous

    ReplyDelete
  5. UnknownSeptember 14, 2018 at 1:11 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  6. miranda allenOctober 4, 2018 at 2:30 PM

    Aardman deserved better.

    ReplyDelete

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