Richard Linklater's ‘Apollo 10 ½’ Now Deemed Eligible by Oscar's Animation Branch

On 10.07.22 it had been reported that one of the best animated movies of the year, Richard Linklater’s “Apollo 10 ½”, was deemed ineligible by the animation branch of the Academy. Linklater was appealing the decision, as he should. Linklater saw this decision as a bias against rotoscope, “animation shouldn’t just be for kids”.

We can now report that Linklater’s appeal was a successful one. His “Apollo 10 ½”, a rotoscope wonder released in the April, and better than almost any animated movie released in 2022, will finally be eligible for the Animation Oscar. Let’s call a spade a spade, It was originally a ridiculous move by the branch, and probably due to potential lobbying from big studios like Disney.

This ineligibility sounds even more preposterous when you take into consideration that Linklater’s “Waking Life” and “A Scanner Darkly” had no such problems getting into the animation Oscar race back in the aughts. Meanwhile, “Marcel The Shell With the Shoes On,” which features real people mixed with stop motion, is also said to be eligible.

I counted 10 contenders for the five slots available in the Best Animated Film category: Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio, Turning Red, Marcel The Shell With the Shoes On, Apollo 10 1/2, The Bad Guys, The Sea Beast, Lightyear, My Father’s Dragon, Wendell & Wild, Inu-Oh, Strange World, and