Annie ♥s Rango

It’s not time for the Oscars yet, but the Annies have already rolled into town. Last Saturday saw the Annie Awards, which honors the year’s highest achievements in (you guessed it) animation, take place in UCLA’s Royce Hall in a ceremony hosted by actor Patton Oswalt. The night’s big award—Best Animated Feature—went to Rango, which is regarded as the frontrunner for that same award at this year’s Oscars.

While Rango won three others Annies (Best Character Design, Best Writing and Best Editing in a Feature Production), one it did not win was Best Directing in a Feature Production. That went to Jennifer Yuh for Kung Fu Panda 2, which also won for Best Production Design. (The animated short Kung Fu Panda: Secrets of the Masters, which was included as a special feature on the Kung Fu Panda 2 home video release, won the award for Best Animated Special Production.) The Adventures of Tintin, which was somewhat surprisingly not nominated for the Best Animated Feature Oscar, won two awards (Best Animated Effects, Best Music) out of five nominations, and actor Bill Nighy picked up the award for Best Voice Acting for his work in Arthur Christmas.

The award for Best Animated Short Film went to director Minkyu Lee’s Adam and Dog. Of the nine nominated films in that category, three of them—Dimanche (Sunday), Wild Life and Pixar’s La Luna— will compete against The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore and A Morning Stroll in the Best Animated Short Film category at the Oscars.

For more information on the Annie Awards and to check out the winners in the television categories, visit annieawards.org.