November
12 HAL Presents Oscar Conspiracy Theater: The Animated Edition

HAL is staying away from the Oscar handicapping game and its half-breed cousin, handicapping the Oscar handicapping game. However, Gawker's Alex Carnevale raises an excellent point: Why is the once-nascent category of animated filmmaking still limited to just three nomination slots? 

The list of films that could be nominated for the Academy's seven-year-old Best Animated Feature Oscar was released, and everything else in the category will be overshadowed by the one lock for a nod, Wall-E. The rest will campaign for just 2 other slots. With more animated films produced outside of the Disney system, small triumphs like the Israeli animated documentary Waltz with Bashir may find themselves on the outside looking in when nominations are announced next year. With only a tiny run in American theaters to put itself into consideration, why is the Academy continue to insists on cramming the field into this tiny category?

There's 14 films in the full submissions list. Six are major-studio CGI ("Bolt," "Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!," "Kung Fu Panda," "Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa," "Wall-E," "The Tale of Despereaux"), four are major-studio-CGI wannabes ("Delgo," "Igor," "Dragon Hunters," "Fly Me to the Moon" -- what, no "Space Chimps"?) two are Japanese anime ("The Sky Crawlers," "Sword of the Stranger") and two are tough to classify: the stop-motion "$9.99" and the animated documentary "Waltz with Bashir."

I don't think anyone's feeling bad for the wannabes (except maybe Harvey Weinstein), but with the continued growth in the number of animated movies each year, the indies are in a position to get screwed. Not that indies aren't used to it, but animation is an art form in which they have a consistent and legitimate opportunity to kick ass and with only three slots, the odds are just too great that they won't even get the chance to square off.

It's not like we need yet another Oscar category (please, we're begging you), especially one like "Eccentric Animated Films That Almost No One Saw But Deserve An Audience More Than Anything Else." But Carnevale's point is a good one: At seven years old, the animated-film category is old enough to cross the street by itself. Maybe it's time to let it stretch its legs into five nominations, like the big kids?