Pixar and Disney may have pulled out of the Annie Awards in a dispute over the way the animation honors are decided, but that didn't stop voters at the International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood, from nominating the companies' films for the 2010 Annie Awards.
In nominations announced on Monday morning, Pixar's "Toy Story 3" and Disney's "Tangled" will compete for Best Animated Feature with Universal's "Despicable Me," DreamWorks Animation's "How to Train Your Dragon" and Sony Classics' "The Illusionist."
But outside of the marquee categories in which it would have caused a scandal to ignore Disney and Pixar films -- especially "Toy Story 3," the highest-grossing animated film of all time and arguably the best-reviewed film of the year -- the Annies almost completely shunned the two companies, which have asked for changes in the awards' voting process.
The result was an embarrassing slate of nominations in which "Toy Story 3" received noms for Best Animated Feature, Best Director (Lee Unkrich) and Best Screenplay (Michael Arndt), but was shut out of the other eight feature-film individual achievement categories, including voice acting, music, storyboarding and character design.
DreamWorks' "How to Train Your Dragon," on the other hand, dominated the individual achievement categories. It picked up 15 nominations overall, including three of the five nominations in the Character Animation in a Feature Production category (DreamWorks' "Megamind" got the other two), and two of the five in the Voice Acting and Storyboarding categories.
DreamWorks Animation had 39 nominations overall. Pixar had four: three for "Toy Story 3," and one for the short "Day & Night." Disney's non-Pixar work had three, two for "Tangled" and one for the Disney Channel's "Phineas & Herb."
Two other DreamWorks films, "Shrek Forever After" and "Megamind," had more overall nominations than "Toy Story," though neither was anywhere near as favorably reviewed.
In the 10 individual achievement categories, DreamWorks had 28 of the 48 total nominations. The company swept two categories, and had at least three of the five nominees in three others.
Disney and Pixar pulled out of the Annies in August, with Disney-Pixar president Ed Catmull saying, "We believe there is an issue with the way the Annies are judged." Disney and Pixar did not submit their films for consideration by the Annies, but ASIFA rules allow it to consider films that are not officially submitted.
Membership in ASIFA is open to anyone who pays a yearly fee, and nominations are voted by members who have been approved by an ASIFA committee. According to reports, DreamWorks Animation automatically buys a membership for every employee, and may employ as much as 40 percent of the total ASIFA membership.
Annies results caused something of a scandal in 2009, when DreamWorks' "Kung Fu Panda" won 10 awards while Pixar's "Wall-E," the eventual Oscar winner and consensus choice for one of the best films of the year, was completely shut out.
