I never watch award shows. Not the Emmy's, Oscars, and especially not the Grammy's (really, when the hell do they ever have musicians people haven't seen there the previous five years in a row?).
For animation, the Oscars originally hired a panel of chimpanzees to vote on which animated feature they enjoyed. Unfortunately due to not being able to determine which were voted for (and the high amount of thrown feces), they decided to go a peg down and use Academy members.
-"I know nothing about animated movies, yet am somehow in the position to judge movies in general." There were 7 total academy members who were in position to vote. Three voted, four abstained. There's another topic from this I'll cover next, but let's focus on the voters first. A big excuse was that the voter simply did not watch all the nominees. Why is it then that they have the time to watch every live action nominee for their respective genres? Do they believe that animated features are not up to their maturity levels, or simply lacking in complexities that you'd get in a traditional film? I obviously can't analyze the mentality of these anonymous voters, but it certainly makes one wonder as to what divides the two mediums in one's head.
-Vote for the popular one! What does one do when you can't decide on what's the best? Just chose which has gained most popularity and best track record! Take Disney for example, they never really do poorly in the animation world. Sure a movie may not stack up, but box office earnings don't care. So here we have the three that voted, and all for Frozen. Why? Well I wouldn't say Frozen was a bad movie, not by a long shot. However it also happens to be the most popular of animated features released last year. That kind of gives hint of a connection, doesn't it?
-Excuses excuses. I can't say much for this other than that they were short. Nothing of true justification came down to it. More of "I just didn't watch them all", or "seen it before" resounded. It's a shame really, and likely due to visual reasons over story and acting.
It hurts a lot to see animation thrown down like this. People put enormous amounts of work into their craft, and with worldwide exposure at the Oscars, they're just stepped on, because no one really cares. That's a painful thing to know as an animator, and really makes me think about where I want to aim with my work.
I think the biggest problem is that this problem won't change. Animation is just too different for these people. Maybe a separate awards show will solve something, I don't know. But what I do know is that minds won't change much at this point.
Will animation ever really be accepted as an equal to classic film making? I don't bank on it, but let's hope so.
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