While hosting a dinner party at the Sundance Film Festival last month, Sony Pictures Classics’ co-founder Michael Barker expressed hope that in a few days, Ari Folman’s “Waltz With Bashir” would get two Oscar nods—one for best animated feature and another for best foreign language picture.
Israel’s entry seemed a sure bet to make the final list of nominees. It did. Come Sunday, it should win Israel’s first Academy Award, for best foreign language picture.
But the stunning animated feature about the invasion of Lebanon, the Sabra and Shatila massacres and former soldier-turned-filmmaker Folman’s reckoning with lost memories was also an undeniable candidate for the best animated picture award.
After all, the year before, Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud’s adaptation of “Persepolis” — Satrapi’s graphic memoir of coming of age during Iran’s religious revolution — competed for best animated feature.
So it was somewhat disappointing when Folman’s remarkable nonfiction work (named best picture of 2008 by the National Society of Film Critics) was passed over for that category.
Instead, the three films vying Sunday night for best animated feature come from Hollywood’s robust animation factories: DreamWork’s “Kung Fu Panda,” and Walt Disney’s “WALL-E” and “Bolt.”
It’s not that these companies don’t employ amazing talent. They do. It’s just that the final list of nominees has some animation fans worried that it reflects Hollywood’s problems with its boldest storytelling genre at a time when animation is getting richer — and more adult — by leaps and bounds.
“I think there’s a general problem in Hollywood feature animation in storytelling,” says Ellen Besen, author of “Animation Unleashed: 100 Principles for Every Animator, Comic Book Writer, Filmmaker, Video Artist and Game Developer Should Know.”
“They’re commercially very successful, but they’ve gotten themselves into a box,” she says.
According to , the budget for “Wall-E” was $180 million, “Kung Fu Panda” cost $130 million and “Bolt,” $150 million. All have surpassed their reported production costs.
Better, each was entertaining.
Still, Besen expects more for the genre. “Animation has the capacity even more so than live action to speak to our dreaming mind. It can go into pure symbolic storytelling,” she says.
“The Hollywood guys have gotten obsessed with the technology and use it in elaborate ways,” Besen says. “But they’ve confused that with good storytelling.”
She believes budget doesn’t determine all. There’s a right vehicle for the story you have to tell.
“Waltz With Bashir” cost Folman $1.7 million to make. And Sony Pictures Classics’ Barker recounts one of Folman’s favorite stories. One day, the Israeli director took his animators to see “Finding Nemo.” The Pixar wonder had 42 animators — for the waves. “Folman had six for his entire film,” he says with a laugh.
Recently, indie distributor Roadside Attractions announced it would release with partner Lionsgate “Battle for Terra,” a 3-D sci-fi adventure in early May. (Indie company Focus Features’ “Coraline” is in theaters.)
“I think this is an absolutely perfect movie for kids,” says Roadside’s co-president Eric d’Arbeloff. “But at the same time Disney and Pixar have created very particular expectations of what a kids’ movie looks like and feels like. This is a little different, a little more demanding.”
Animation, says d’Arbeloff, can give indie-budget films a more sweeping feel. “Especially given that we’re working in the independent arena, you can create epic-scale movies on a reasonable budget,” he says.
It also has an appeal for actors.
“From their perspective, if they’re really passionate about a script, they can give a day or two days to voice a role, whereas going on location, no matter how passionate they are, a lot of name actors aren’t necessarily going to have the time to do that.”
Philip Seymour Hoffman and Toni Collette provided the lead performances in “Mary and Max,” which opened the Sundance Film Festival.
Adam Elliot’s stop-action recounting of the real-life tale of two friends wasn’t the first animated feature to open the indie fest. That honor goes to Brett Morgan’s 2007 documentary, “Chicago 10,” about the 1968 Democratic Convention and the infamous trial that followed. Among the actors giving voice to such characters as Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin and lawyer William Kunstler were Hank Azaria, Mark Ruffalo and Liev Schreiber.
While Hollywood seems locked in story problems, says author Besen, indie animated features and documentaries are freed by new technology. “Now you and your computer can do a feature film,” she says. “That’s a revolution.”
One exemplar of the solo creator telling a profoundly personal tale with the aid of a desktop is Nina Paley’s delight, “Sita Sings the Blues.” The filmmaker’s debut feature will vie Saturday afternoon for a 2009 Spirit Award against two live-action features. (Live telecast, IFC Comcast Channel 503, 3 p.m.)
The funny, lush film about heartbreak and myth was among the first the Denver Film Society’s Brit Withey sang the praises of while running through last year’s Starz Denver Film Festival slate. It won the SDFF’s emerging filmmaker award. Last week, it was named best animated feature at the Boulder International Film Festival.
SDFF also held a special presentation of “Waltz With Bashir.” In fact, in training their focus on animation last year, the SDFF’s programmers seemed prophetic about the tug of the art form. Though Withey is quick to remind his listener that Denver’s film festival has always been interested in animated work.
“We have a track record. We’ve played every one of Bill Plympton’s animated features,” Withey says.
“The medium gives you a freedom to do all these interesting things you can’t do with live-action films. Imagine if ‘Waltz With Bashir’ weren’t animated,” he adds.
It might have been an interesting documentary. But it would have relied on talking heads recounting their memories. Folman would have needed stock footage of the Lebanon War.
“But there’s no way you could have gotten into the minds of the people in that war and really show what they went through,” he says with relish. “It completely changed how that film turned out. It was amazing.”
Film critic Lisa Kennedy: 303-954-1567 or lkennedy@denverpost.com; also on blogs.denverpostcom/madmoviegoer
