Golden Globes Nominees Announced

The toonzone reports (via GoldenGlobes.org) that the nominees for the 67th annual Golden Globes have been announced.

While the nominees do include a few celebrities who have had voice roles, none of their voice acting roles were nominated so I’m not mentioning them here.

However, nominated in the category for “Best Animated Feature Film” are:

Additionally, James Cameron’s Avatar — the big-budget live-action/computer-animated/motion-capture epic — has surprisingly received four nominations: Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Director – Motion Picture, Best Original Score – Motion Picture, and Best Original Song – Motion Picture.

Yes, you read that correctly: Best Motion Picture – Drama.

I know. Shocking, isn’t it?

And 20th Century Fox is touting Avatar as “the next generation of 3D” and furthermore (and rather presumptuously, I must say) as “the greatest adventure of all time.” Cameron even says in an interview, “It doesn’t look like anything you’ve seen before.”

I’m reserving my judgement until I see it, but if you believe the advance hype, this movie is some sort of life-altering event that will change everything: the way films are made, the way sandwiches are made, and the way babies are made. Next comes people painting themselves blue and thinking they can jump off cliffs and not be injured.

It’s just beyond rare for this sort of special FX, sci-fi/fantasy extravaganza to get such accolades from an organization like the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (host of The Golden Globes).

And you might be wondering, as I am, why Avatar received four nominations and yet none involve the cast, nor is a single actor from the film even acknowledged… like Sam Worthington who performs triple duties in this film: live action, motion-capture and voice actor (and likely did some of his own stunts too).

Aussie blogger Giles Hardie with The Sydney Morning Herald makes a great case for this. Give it a click. It’s well worth the read.

James Cameron’s Avatar opens in theaters Friday, December 18th and stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez, Giovanni Ribisi, Joel Moore, Wes Studi and Laz Alonso. Also look/listen for CCH Pounder as Moat. Pounder has voiced characters in such animated series as Justice League, W.I.T.C.H., Static Shock, Batman Beyond and Gargoyles.

IMDb.com has a full cast list as well as a video link with a behind-the-scenes featurette interviewing Cameron and members of the cast and crew.

On a related topic, the toonzone blog has been doing a series reflecting on the worst and best animation of this past decade: Toons of the 2000s, and among them is a spotlight on the Top 5 Animated Features.