Richard Linklater pissed at the Academy after it deems Apollo 10 1/2 ineligible for Best Animated Feature
Linklater: "I get this feeling that they’re basically like, ‘Indie weirdos, go home.’”
Aux News Richard Linklater
Director Richard Linklater is getting vocal about his frustrations with The Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences this week, after the Oscar-granting body decided that his recent film Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood doesn’t qualify for its Best Animated Feature Film category, on account of not being animated enough.
Like Linklater’s previous animated films, Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly, Apollo achieves its look through the age-old process of rotoscoping, an animation technique in which artists draw over live-action footage, creating a distinctive sense of motion that looks like very little else in the medium. More than 200 animators worked on the film, which does not appear to have been sufficient for the Academy, which issued a decree back in July that it “does not feel that the techniques meet the definition of animation in the category rules” for Best Animated Feature Film.
In conversations with IndieWire this week, Linklater and his animation director, Tommy Pallotta, both expressed their anger at the Academy’s verdict. “I feel like if I’ve been caught in a Kafkaesque nightmare where someone is saying something isn’t real and I know it’s real,” Pallotta said, noting that Apollo is a blend of rotoscoped outlines for figures and lush animation surrounding (and on top of) them. Linklater, meanwhile, was blunt about what he sees as the commercial motivations for the exclusion: “The [animation] industry is clustered around kids’ entertainment. I get this feeling that they’re basically like, ‘Indie weirdos, go home.’”
Linklater also shared a letter he sent to the Academy about the verdict. “This naturalistic style is not a technical choice but rather an artistic choice in the crucial area of how I want the film to look and feel,” the director wrote.
It is accomplished by the hard work of animators drawing character motion and performances frame by frame, not a side effect of some hidden software or automatic process…We entirely reject the outdated and discriminatory notion that, in an industry dominated by the technical advancements in big budget CGI 3D films, some traditional animation techniques are less pure or authentic even after they meet the technical requirements for consideration.
21 Comments
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs used rotoscoping. I’d love for the Academy to say it wasn’t actually animated.
Yeah, I can see how old traditional hand-drawn cel animators might see rotoscoping as “cheating”, but it is absurd to think that way in the era of computer animation being accepted as animation (as it should).Anyway, the film was wonderful and should watch it if you haven’t.
except that traditional hand drawn cell animations like Snow White used the the same technique used in this film.
Yeah a lot of the classic Disney stuff was animated off actual actors, they also reused a lot of animation from one film to another, just changing the characters.
EDIT: what the fuck is Kinja’s deal w/YouTube links, lately?
They will never give him an Oscar.
Ralph Bakshi is spinning in his grave!
Ralph Bakshi is spinning in his grave!And he’s not even dead yet!
At 24 FPS!
I’ll totally agree with Linklater if I don’t see Everything Everywhere All At Once in the Best Picture category this year.
Yeah, this isn’t animation enough but digital animation is?
How many nominees used mocap? I’ll bet it was a lot.
This is the most transparently bullshit reason to disqualify a film from consideration that I’ve ever read. Either the Academy fundamentally doesn’t understand what rotoscoping is (which I wouldn’t be shocked about), or they’re looking for an excuse to disqualify this film specifically.
Bizarre, it’s clearly animated.
Also a very enjoyable movie. Didn’t get nearly enough love or attention when first released, and now the Academy seems keen to snub it, too. It’s such an easy movie to recommend though, because I can’t imagine many people not enjoying it (it’s just a very likeable film).
That’s a shame – really enjoyed the movie overall. Linklater is a master at capturing the spirit of a bygone era and making you long for your childhood.
…there’s a new Richard Linklater movie?!
Man, I loved this movie.
The Oscars… not so much.
Just yet another example of how the Academy (and Hollywood in general) refuse to accept that animation can be anything other than Disney/kids movies.
A typical Pixar film does not contain a single hand-drawn frame and is eligible for animated feature awards.
Submit it for Best Picture and watch them reject it for being animated.
So, when we had that whole “internation” vs “foreign language” controversy a few years back, it turned out the reason was just to fuck over the Brits, not Africa. Is there a similar thing here?