‘How to Train Your Dragon 2’ and Mickey Mouse Shorts Dominate Annie Awards
After a difficult week for DreamWorks in which they announced the largest layoff ever, the studio dominated the Annie Awards tonight. Their film How to Train Your Dragon 2 won the Annie Award for best feature film, which now sets it up as the favorite to win the Oscar.
Dragon 2 also picked up five other honors, including directing (Dean DeBlois), character animation (Fabio Lignini) and music (John Powell and Jónsi).
A number of other features took home one or two awards apiece. The LEGO Movie won best writing (Phil Lord and Chris Miller), The Book of Life won character design (Paul Sullivan, Sandra Equihua, Jorge R. Gutierrez), Big Hero 6 won animated effects (Michael Kaschalk, Peter DeMund, David Hutchins, Henrik Falt, John Kosnik), and The Boxtrolls won production design (Paul Lasaine, Tom McClure, August Hall), and voice acting (Sir Ben Kingsley).
On the TV side, Disney’s Mickey Mouse shorts dominated the voting categories with a surprising six wins. Also, The Simpsons won best general audience TV program, Gravity Falls won TV program for children, Tumble Leaf won TV program for preschool. The latter series, which was produced for Amazon, marks the first time that an Internet streaming series has won a TV prize at the Annies.
Disney’s latest short Feast, directed by Patrick Osborne, won the short subject category, while Jason Rayner’s My Big Brother, a film from Savannah College of Art and Design, won the best student film. My Big Brother premiered online last year as one of the winners of Cartoon Brew’s Student Animation Festival.
The thing that perhaps stood out most to me as I watched the ceremony via livestream was the near complete absence of women from the stage. More women actually presented awards than accepted them as winners. Among the forty-four winners of awards in the individual achievement and juried categories, 41 of them were men (93%).
Yes, a greater percentage of men work in animation, but the divide is not nearly so great as suggested by the imbalance at tonight’s awards. To put it another way, the Annie Award voters felt that just three women made exemplary contributions to animation throughout all of 2014. There’s simply no defense for this kind of patriarchy in our industry.
But it’s not just the lack of women that caused a raised eyebrow. Only two of the 44 individual/juried winners appeared to be Hispanic (and those two were a husband-and-wife team winning the same award) and zero winners were African-American. This isn’t about political correctness; it’s about the basic expectation that all the work created in the industry will be considered and that the finest work will be rewarded, regardless of its creator’s ethnicity or gender. The animation industry that I know is far more diverse and vibrant than the select group of people who were recognized tonight.
The point about the industry’s diversity was made most poignantly by Lee Mendelson, one of the Winsor McCay award honorees. Mendelson, who produced all of the classic Charlie Brown TV specials, made a plea for immigration reform during his speech, pointing out that the Peanuts specials would have never happened without Bill Melendez, the Mexican-born director of Peanuts animation. Mendelson also gave a shout-out to veteran animator Phil Roman, the Mexican-American animator whose studio, Film Roman, produced The Simpsons for many years.
A complete list of winners is below:
PRODUCTION CATEGORIES
Best Animated Feature
- How to Train Your Dragon 2 – DreamWorks Animation
Best Animated Special Production
- Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey – Voyager Pictures LLC
Best Animated Short Subject
- Feast - Walt Disney Animation Studios
Best Animated TV/Broadcast Commercial
- Flight of the Stories – Aardman Animations
Best General Audience Animated TV/Broadcast Production For Preschool Children
- Tumble Leaf - Amazon Studios
Best Animated TV/Broadcast Production For Children’s Audience
- Gravity Falls – Disney Television Animation
Best General Audience Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- The Simpsons – The Simpsons
Best Animated Video Game
- Valiant Hearts: The Great War – Ubisoft
Best Student Film
- My Big Brother - Jason Rayner
INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT CATEGORIES
Outstanding Achievement, Animated Effects in an Animated Production
- Michael Kaschalk, Peter DeMund, David Hutchins, Henrik Falt, John Kosnik – Big Hero 6 – Walt Disney Animation Studios
Outstanding Achievement, Animated Effects in a Live Action Production
- Steve Avoujageli, Atsushi Ikarashi, Pawel Grochola, Paul Waggoner, Viktor Lundqvist – Edge of Tomorrow – Sony Pictures Imageworks
Outstanding Achievement, Character Animation in an Animated Television/Broadcast Production
- Justin Nichols – Wander Over Yonder – Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Character Animation in a Feature Production
- Fabio Lignini – How to Train Your Dragon 2 - DreamWorks Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Character Animation in a Live Action Production
- Daniel Barrett, Paul Story, Eteuati Tema, Alessandro Bonora, Dejan Momcilovic – Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Weta Digital
Outstanding Achievement, Character Animation in a Video Game
- Mike Mennillo – Assassin’s Creed Unity – Ubisoft
Outstanding Achievement, Character Design in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Benjamin Balistreri – Wander Over Yonder - Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Character Design in an Animated Feature Production
- Paul Sullivan, Sandra Equihua, Jorge R. Gutierrez – The Book of Life – Reel FX
Outstanding Achievement, Directing in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Aaron Springer – Disney Mickey Mouse - Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Directing in an Animated Feature Production
- Dean DeBlois – How to Train Your Dragon 2 – DreamWorks Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Music in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Christopher Willis – Disney Mickey Mouse – Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Music in an Animated Feature Production
- John Powell, Jónsi – How to Train Your Dragon 2 – DreamWorks Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Production Design in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Narina Sokolova – Mickey Shorts - Disney
Outstanding Achievement, Production Design in an Animated Feature Production
- Paul Lasaine, Tom McClure & August Hall – The Boxtrolls – Focus Features/Laika
Outstanding Achievement, Storyboarding in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Joaquim Dos Santos – Legend of Korra –Nickelodeon Animation Studio
Outstanding Achievement, Storyboarding in an Animated Feature Production
- Truong “Tron” Son Mai – How to Train Your Dragon 2 – DreamWorks Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Voice Acting in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Bill Farmer as the voices of Goofy and Grandma – Disney Mickey Mouse – Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Voice Acting in an Animated Feature Production
- Sir Ben Kingsley as the voice of Archibald Snatcher – The Boxtrolls – Focus Features/Laika
Outstanding Achievement, Writing in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Darrick Bachman – Disney Mickey Mouse – Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Writing in an Animated Feature Production
- Phil Lord & Christopher Miller – The Lego Movie – Warner Bros. Pictures
Outstanding Achievement, Editorial in an Animated TV/Broadcast Production
- Illya Owens – Disney Mickey Mouse – Disney Television Animation
Outstanding Achievement, Editorial in an Animated Feature Production
- John K. Carr – How to Train Your Dragon 2 – DreamWorks Animation
JURIED AWARDS
Winsor McCay Award (for Lifetime Achievement)
Didier Brunner, Don Lusk and Lee Mendelson
June Foray Award (for significant and benevolent or charitable impact on the art and industry of animation)
Charles Solomon
Ub Iwerks (for technical advancement that has made a significant impact on the art or industry of animation)
DreamWorks Animation’s Apollo Software
Special Achievement Award (recognizing the unique and significant impact on the art and industry of animation)
The Walt Disney Family Museum
