Something is happening.
Among American film critics, WALL-E is emerging as a favorite for the year’s Best Picture. The L.A. Film Critics just joined TIME’s Richard Corliss and The New Yorker’s Anthony Lane, heralding Pixar’s movie as the Best Film of 2008. The only film receiving similar love is Slumdog Millionaire.
Will the Academy take notice? Will they realize that animated films are works of art worthy of comparison with live-action films? Will WALL-E be nominated for Best Picture?
I hope so.
Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” was nominated back in 1991 so it wouldn’t have been the first time.
The difference there being that the Best Animated Feature category didn’t exist in 1991, and that Disney was in the midst of a “renaissance” that had begun only two years earlier with The Little Mermaid. Pixar, on the other hand, peaked a few years ago in the minds of some critics and audiences (to go by the grosses, in the case of the latter), and the existence of the Animated Feature award means the Academy might divert any praise it wants to give the film in that direction.
Though it’s interesting that the L.A. critics gave Best Picture to WALL-E (narrowly beating The Dark Knight, for whatever that’s worth) while giving Best Animated Feature to Waltz with Bashir. If WALL-E does get nominated in both categories at the Oscars, it is quite possible the vote might get split between the two categories. Or perhaps it will win both. Who knows?