While fellow nominees like Sony Pictures Animation’s Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse were projected to take home the win, Miyazaki’s film – this being his final pr.
The 96th Academy Awards indicate that animation isn’t merely a genre, but rather an ever-expanding medium.
The Oscars are one of the biggest nights in film. From the star-studded red carpet to Oppenheimer’s award sweep and Ryan Gosling’s infectious “Kenergy,” last night’s show was no different. It included many highlights while celebrating this season’s cinema gems and the upward trajectory of the industry after the recent strikes. But perhaps one of the most standout moments came during the animation category when longtime Japanese filmmaker, Hayao Miyazaki’s The Boy and The Heron was named Best Animated Feature.
While fellow nominees like Sony Pictures Animation’s Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse were projected to take home the win, Miyazaki’s film – this being his final project from his beloved Studio Ghibli – received the award. The Boy and The Heron is also the first PG-13 animated feature with this honor, as most of the Academy’s choices have been for family and children-age audiences. After a lifetime of bringing animated stories like My Neighbor Totoro, Howl’s Moving Castle and countless others, Studio Ghibli could not be more deserving of the award.
While Miyazaki wasn’t present to claim the Oscar statue, as the production did not attend or accept the award, there is still a major revelation that comes with this honor. Audiences can see how established traditional machines of animation like Netflix NFLX , Disney and Sony are falling short of other projects in the animation space, signaling the Academy’s recognition for the future of animation features. This year’s animated feature Oscar nominees and the winner tell us a new story in animation; one that marks a departure from the traditional and perhaps more homogenized batch of animated features to a more exciting time.
