We should expect to hear from the Academy in early December as to how many films are eligible this year for Best Animated Feature. For now, this remains a tight two-horse race between the acclaimed sequel to a film that won this prize back in 2018 and the latest masterpiece from a master of Japanese animation. We’re likely going to see Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and The Boy and the Heron split the critics groups prizes and then it’s anyone’s guess how the Academy will go.
Pixar’s latest Elemental stumbled out of the gate with a poor box office opening and tepid early reviews. But it recovered to sit on 74% on Rotten Tomatoes and earn almost $500 million worldwide, making it feel somewhat safe to take that third spot. The same can’t be said for Disney’s Wish, which has received dreadful reviews and disastrous box office numbers. It’s never wise to rule out the House of Mouse in this category, but Wish faces an uphill battle.
That really leaves those final two spots open to all sorts of possibilities, especially for smaller titles like Sony Pictures Classic’s The Peasants that struggle for attention against the might of major animation studios. Much like Flee in 2019, it’s scored a run at Best International Feature Film as Poland’s submission and it’s something that should be to the Academy’s taste. The $1.3 billion box office for The Super Mario Bros. Movie might make it hard for the Academy to ignore, but popularity isn’t always a big factor in this race. Just look at Frozen II.
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE PREDICTIONS:
1. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Sony Pictures)
2. The Boy and the Heron (GKIDS)
3. Elemental (Pixar)
4. The Peasants (Sony Pictures Classics)
5. The Super Mario Bros. Movie (Universal Pictures)
IN CONTENTION
Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget (Netflix)
Ernest & Celestine: A Trip to Gibbertia (GKIDS)
Migration (Universal Pictures)
The Monkey King (Netflix)
Nimona (Netflix)
PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie (Paramount Pictures)
Robot Dreams (NEON)
Suzume (Crunchyroll)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (Paramount Pictures)
They Shot the Piano Player (Sony Pictures Classics)
Trolls Band Together (DreamWorks)
Wish (Walt Disney Pictures)
