It was bad enough when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences declined to nominate Wall-E for Best Picture, opting instead for a wave of middlebrow mush. Now, in an effort to outperform that obtuseness, the International Animated Film Society has declared that Wall-E isn't even the best animated film, instead conferring that honor (it's called an "Annie," get it?) on Kung Fu Panda. Now, I enjoyed that film as much as the next guy (though perhaps not quite so much as Bolt: it was a good year for animated movies). But the idea that it is in any way in the same class as Wall-E --or, for that matter, the extraordinary hybrid Waltz with Bashir--is frankly deranged. This is shaping up to be a groundbreakingly awful awards season.
--Christopher Orr