Definitive Proof That Academy Voters Are Ignorant About Animation

Those of us in animation always gripe that the rest of Hollywood doesn’t care or know the first thing about animated films. There are tons of anecdotal stories to support this position, but finally, we’ve got some definitive proof. And if you think Hollywood doesn’t understand animation, it’s even worse than you could imagine.

The Hollywood Reporter recently published interviews with seven anonymous Academy members about how they voted for this year’s nominees. Four of the seven Academy members abstained from voting for best animated feature. The three that did vote all chose Frozen. Here is what each of them said:

Animated features are consistently more successful than live-action films in Hollywood, and yet, no respect. The animated short category didn’t fare better. Only one of the seven surveyed Academy members voted in the category (or spoke to THR about voting). Their excuses for not voting ranged from:

I got that coffin of a box from the Academy [with DVDs of the shorts in it], and the discs started falling out and I just said, “Screw it. Life’s too short.” I thought [sending them to us] was a nice thing to do, though.

to:

I don’t watch the shorts. And, if I don’t know anybody who made one of them — a friend or an enemy — I just don’t vote, which was the case this year.

The one person who voted in the animated short category chose Get A Horse! even though they questioned ‘what was old footage’ and ‘what was new footage’:

It was kind of an off-year. I wasn’t bowled over. The Disney one I saw originally in 3D and then again in 2D. For people who didn’t see it on a big screen before Frozen and are only seeing it on a screener, it’s like watching Gravity in 2D. I’m a little unclear about what they did on that one — what was old footage, what was new footage — and I’m a little apprehensive about rooting for the giant. But I felt like I’d seen most of the others before — the [Room with a] Broom one I liked best of those.