Disney, Pixar, ‘Star Tours’ Among Nominees for 2011 Annie Awards

The International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood, today announced its nominations for the 39th Annual Annie Awards, recognizing the year’s best in the field of animation.

Pixar Animation Studios finds itself competing for the top honors in the categories for Best Animated Feature, with Cars 2 and La Luna for Best Animated Short Subject. Interestingly enough, although La Luna won’t be formally released until it opens with Brave in 2012, it has been screened enough to satisfy requirements for many awards including the Annie and the Oscar (for which it has been shortlisted for a nod). This means that it’s also competing against The Ballad of Nessie from Walt Disney Animation Studios, which played before Winnie the Pooh (which does not find itself nominated).

Other films competing for Best Animated Feature are: A Cat in Paris (Folimage); Arrugas (Wrinkles) (Perro Verde Films, S.L.); Arthur Christmas (Sony Pictures Animation, Aardman Animations); Chico & Rita (Chico & Rita Distribution Limited); Kung Fu Panda 2 (DreamWorks Animation); Puss In Boots (DreamWorks Animation); Rango (Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies present A Blind Wink/GK Films Production); Rio (Blue Sky Studios); and Tintin (Amblin Entertainment, Wingnut Films and Kennedy/Marshall).

Walt Disney Animation Studios picked up another nomination in the category of Best General Audience Animated TV Production with its ‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’ special. Disney Television Animation is nominated for Best Animated Television Production (Preschool) for ‘Jake and the Neverland Pirates’ and ‘Mickey Mouse Clubhouse’ which are competing against Disney Junior colleague ‘Chuggington’ from Ludorum Pictures.

Industrial Light and Magic also finds themselves nominated for the ‘Star Tours: The Adventures Continue’ attraction at the Walt Disney World and Disneyland Resorts (as well as Tokyo Disneyland in the near future) in the category of Best Animated Special Production.

For the individual achievement categories: Dan Lund (Winnie the Pooh), Eric Froemling (Cars 2) and Jon Reisch (Cars 2) for Animated Effects in an Animated Production; Branko Grujcic of Industial Light & Magic (Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides) for Animated Effects in a Live Action Production; Chad Sellers (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’), Rebecca Wilson Bresee (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’) and Tony Smeed (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’) for Character Animation in a Television Production; Andreas Deja (Winnie the Pooh), Mark Henn (Winnie the Pooh) for Character Animation in a Feature Production; Bill Schwab (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’) and Carl Raggio (‘Kick Buttowski’) for Character Design in a Television Production; Jay Shuster (Cars 2) for Character Design in a Feature Production; Chris Savino & Clay Morrow (‘Kick Buttowski’) and Kevin Deters & Stevie Wermers-Skelton (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’) for Directing in a Television Production; Don Hall & Stephen Anderson (Winnie the Pooh) and Kelly Asbury (Gnomeo & Juliet) for Directing in a Feature Production; Grace Potter & Michael Giacchino (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice’) and Joel McNeely, Brendan Milburn and Valerie Vigoda (‘Pixie Hollow Games’) for Music in a Television Production; Zooey Deschannel, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Henry Jackman and Robert Lopez (Winnie the Pooh) for Music in a Feature Production; Harley Jessup (Cars 2), Paul Felix (Winnie the Pooh) for Production Design in a Feature Film; Barry W. Johnson (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs Nice’), Brian Kesinger (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs Nice’) and Joe Mateo (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs Nice’) for Storyboarding in a Television Production; Nelson Yokota (Gnomeo and Juliet) and Scott Morse (Cars 2) for Storyboarding in a Feature Production; Jim Cummings (Gnomeo and Juliet) for Voice Acting in a Feature Production; Blake Lemons, William Reiss, C.H. Greenblatt, Derek Evanick, Diana Lafyatis, Neil Graf (‘Disney Fish Hooks – Fish School Musical’) and Steve Wermers-Skelton and Kevin Deters (‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs Nice’) for Writing in a Television Production; Andy Riley, Kevin Cecil, Mark Burton, Kathy Greenburg, Emily Cook, Rob Sprackling, John R. Smith, Kelly Asbury, Steve Hamilton (Gnomeo and Juliet) and Brian Kesinger, Kendelle Hoyer, Don Dougherty, Clio Chang, Don Hall, Stephen Anderson (Winnie The Pooh) for Writing in a Feature Animation; and Stephen Schaffer, A.C.E. (Cars 2) for Editing in a Feature Presentation.

The Walt Disney Company returns its support for the Annies this year after calling for a boycott last year in which they refused to sponsor or submit any films because of a dispute over the voting process. Disney claimed the voting body (for which the only requirement is membership, available to virtually anyone) was heavily biased towards DreamWorks Animation which makes it a practice to purchase memberships for each of its employees. In response, the International Animated Film Society nominated Disney films anyway and realized Disney’s likely fear that How To Train Your Dragon would take best picture over Toy Story 3, which it did. After some promised changes by the industry group, Disney has returned to support the awards this year with Disney Toon Studios, Pixar Animation Studios and Walt Disney Animation Studios all listed individually as Silver Sponsors.

The 2011 Annie Award winners will be announced at the 39th Annual Annie Awards ceremony on Saturday, February 4, 2012, at UCLA’s Royce Hall, in Los Angeles, CA. For a complete list of Annie Award nominations, ticket and event information, visit www.annieawards.org.