The Academy Award nominations are out and, unsurprisingly, La La Land leads with 14. However, it’s nice to see Fences, Hidden Figures and Moonlight getting some love, especially in the Best Picture category.
LAIKA’s Kubo and the Two Strings also received some Oscar praise with two nominations: Best Animated Feature (alongside Moana, My Life as a Zucchini, The Red Turtle and Zootopia) and Best Visual Effects (with Deepwater Horizon, Doctor Strange, Jungle Book, and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story). The latter is significant because this is the first time an animated film has been nominated in the visual effects category since 1994’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.
As expected, filmmakers were excited about the big news. Here’s what director Travis Knight told The Mary Sue in an official statement:
“I’m over the moon! An Academy Award nomination is an extraordinary and cherished gift Two nominations is more than anyone could hope for. Every filmmaker dreams of a moment like this. But the truth is, I already lived my dream by making this film. Movies have always given me great joy. They enriched my life. They inspired me to dream. That’s the kind of film our team at LAIKA sought to make with Kubo and the Two Strings. A film is a slice of a hundred souls. In this case many more. An incredible, immense community of artists gave ceaselessly and selflessly to breathe life into this story. I’m so thankful for their talents and efforts and so proud of what we’ve done together. I’m profoundly grateful to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, who somehow saw fit to include us among the finest storytellers in film. It is a tremendous honor to stand alongside them.”
Steve Emerson, Oliver Jones, Brian McLean and Brad Schiff, the visual effects producers on the film, were equally enthused. “As much as Kubo and the Two Strings is an homage to Japanese culture and to woodblock artists including Kiyoshi Saito, it is also a tribute to special effects pioneers Ray Harryhausen, Willis O’Brien, Jim Danforth, and the many innovative FX artists who tell stories using in-camera effects, puppets, and human hands,” they added.
“We’re thrilled for the artists at LAIKA who put years into realizing Kubo. For all of us at the studio, being recognized alongside such distinguished and talented members of the VFX community is truly an honor.”
The official ceremony airs on February 26.
(image via screencap)
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