There was some controversy this year (and in past years), as to why animated features are so often left out of the Best Picture category at the Academy Awards. Only Beauty and the Beast was nominated in this category (losing to The Silence of the Lambs), and this year many think WALL-E should have been included. Look no further than Rotten Tomatoes to see what critics thought of the film – ranking it the highest of any major release with a 96% rating. You shouldn’t be surprised that the same thing happened in 2007 – Ratatouille did the same thing with a 96% “freshness” rating.

So if our films are going to get this cold shoulder, let’s do a little math. At the Oscars, it’s not about box office, but the day before and the day after, it’s all about box office. So let’s look at a yearly comparison of Best Picture films vs. Best Animated Features – since 2001, the year the Best Animated Feature category was added. As you can see, animated films regularly beat out the live-action projects, and have earned 33% more at the box office since 2001. I leave you with one word – “scoreboard.”

By the way, animated films aren’t the only projects left out in the cold – only eight foreign language films have been nominated for Best Picture.

After Kung Fu Panda swept the Annies in January, Disney-Pixar’s WALL·E took the award for Best animated feature film of the year at the 81st Academy Awards. It wasn’t a real surprise, as WALL·E has been a critical darling all year. In his restrained acceptance speech, director/producer Andrew Stanton said “It’s been such an inspiration to spend time with a character who so tenaciously struggles to find the beauty in everything that he sees. It’s a noble aspiration to have at times like these.” Right you are, Andrew. Here’s a 4-minute featurette of WALL·E you might not have seen:

And a big congrats to Pixar artist Jay Shuster, my childhood pal, who was one of the designers of WALL·E himself.

I kinda thought Pete Docter (Up) should have gotten a shout out – as I think he was the originator of the concept for WALL·E. Eh – you’ve got :45 seconds, so I supposed it’s no surprise.

The nominations for the 81st Academy Awards have been announced, and today we’ll take a look at the 2 animation categories…

Animated Short Film

Five films were nominated, most notably Oktapodi – as it’s a student film. Few (if any) student-produced films have been nominated in this category. Pretty impressive. Here’s our five contenders.

Lavatory — Lovestory

A Russian film by director Konstantin Bronzit about a bathroom attendant searching frantically for her secret admirer in a love story that can’t be stalled. Here’s the 10-minute film in its entirety.

Oktapodi

A 2:30 minute graduation film by six students at Gobelins in France. Oktapodi follows two octopuses who help each other escape from the grasps of a stubborn restaurant cook. The directing team was comprised of Julien Bocabeille, François-Xavier Chanioux, Olivier Delabarre, Thierry Marchand, Quentin Marmier and Emud Mokhberi. Here’s the film in it’s entirety:

I’m very excited. But you’ll have to wait at least a paragraph to find out why. The nominees for this year’s 2009 BAFTA Film Awards have been announced. Included in the list of feature length animations are Waltz with Bashir, Wall-E, and Persepolis.

The Short Animation shortlist includes Nick Park’s Wallace and Gromit A Matter of Loaf and Death, Marc Craste and Sue Goffe’s Varmints and… erm… The Brothers McLeod’s Codswallop. Excuse me while I shout “YESSS!” into a paper bag to keep for later. Both Marc Craste and Nick Park are former winners and are pretty much titans in the UK animation world so it’s tough competition. Whichever way it goes, it’s great to be sharing a nomination with them. Here’s our trailer:

Animation is definitely having a good year at the various entertainment awards. FOX’s long-running animated series The Simpsons leads all nominees at the WGA awards and Pixar’s WALL-E became the first animated project in the history of the Los Angeles Critics Assn. to be named Best Film. WALL-E was also named amongst the AFIs 10 best films of the year. We now await the Academy Award nominations – which are announced January 22nd.

Disney releases the Wall-E DVD tomorrow, and aside from deleted scenes and a viewing of Presto, you’ll be treated to Burn-E, a new CGI-animated short. The 7-minute film tells the story of a repair robot named Burn-E, who is sent out to fix a broken light on the Axiom. His adventures take place during the timeline of the original Andrew Stanton film, but this short was directed by Angus MacLane. Watch the short below, and then go read an interview with MacLane over at movieweb.com.

Jennifer Guthrie, a SCAD graduate in Kentucky, went above and beyond the parental obligation this year to create a WALL•E costume for her youngest. The year before, Guthrie’s oldest got to go as a Mechwarrior, a costume that was also elaborately designed. Don’t worry, this year the oldest got a good costume too. He went as another WALL•E character: a passenger from The Axiom.

The WALL-E DVD comes out November 18th.