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Flow vs. The Wild Robot: An Oscar Race to Remember
This past award season was another whirlwind of chaos. Anora reversed its fortunes seemingly overnight, Emilia Pérez went from an unstoppable awards magnet to the controversial elephant in the room, and Joker: Folie à Deux became a future target for This Had Oscar Buzz. If there was one constant throughout this otherwise unpredictable season, it was the five Best Animated Feature nominees. 2024 was another banner year for animation with more than five worthy contenders. Chicken for Linda!, Transformers One, and The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie are just a few gems that got lost in the award season shuffle. Before any awards groups announced their nominees, though, a clear consensus five was solidified.
Gints Zilbalodis’ Flow quickly entered the Oscar conversation upon premiering at the Cannes Film Festival where it competed for the Un Certain Regard. Kelsey Mann put Pixar back on top with Inside Out 2, the highest-grossing animated feature until Ne Zha 2 usurped the title. Oscar winner Adam Elliot was bound to achieve his second nomination for Memoir of a Snail, which won the coveted Cristal Award at Annecy. You should never count out Nick Park for an Oscar nomination. Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl, which he co-directed with Merlin Crossingham, would be no exception.
DreamWorks had an early frontrunner with Chris Sanders’ adaptation of Peter Brown’s novel, The Wild Robot. Building upon the illustrated aesthetic that DreamWorks established in The Bad Guys and the Oscar-nominated Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Sanders drew further inspiration from Disney, Studio Ghibli, and painter Daniel Cacouault. With the essence of a living painting, the watercolor visuals engrossed audiences in nature at its most atmospheric and threatening. Sanders also told a heartfelt story of parenthood balanced with a timely message about using AI responsibly. Critics hailed The Wild Robot as possibly the crowning achievement of DreamWorks Animation. The praise was bittersweet knowing that this would be DreamWorks’ last film animated entirely in-house.
DreamWorks wasn’t going anywhere with Dog Man hitting theaters months later, but the brand would become dependent on more third-party studios moving forward. An Oscar for The Wild Robot could be one way to cap off the end of an era. It’d also provide an opportunity to acknowledge one of the Best Animated Feature category’s most prominent blind spots. Sanders worked on classics like Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Mulan before making the leap to director with Lilo & Stitch. He received his first Oscar nomination for that post-Disney Reinsurance highlight, although co-director Dean DeBlois was omitted due to Academy rules at the time. Sanders just might have won if only Lilo & Stitch didn’t go up against Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away.
Timing again wasn’t on Sanders’ side when he got his second Oscar nomination for DreamWorks’ How to Train Your Dragon, which marked DeBlois’ first nod. Dragon surely would’ve won any other year, but Sanders and DeBlois had to compete with a Best Picture nominee, Toy Story 3. Sanders was back in competition with Miyazaki when DreamWorks’ The Croods was nominated against The Wind Rises, although the winner was Disney’s unstoppable blizzard, Frozen. The Wild Robot earned Sanders his fourth nomination, tying Miyazaki and Pixar’s Pete Docter for the category’s most nods overall. Where Miyazaki and Docter both had three statuettes apiece, Sanders stood out as the category’s most-nominated director without a win. Between Sanders’ career narrative, solid box office, and glowing reviews, The Wild Robot appeared poised to change that.
The question was what film would be in second place. Inside Out 2 left critics joyful with many feeling Kelsey Mann made a sequel that evolved the characters, world, and themes. Some detractors argued the plot too closely mirrored its Oscar-winning predecessor, which set the bar impossibly high. Outside of Toy Story 3 and 4, the Academy had never gone for a sequel in Best Animated Feature. While Inside Out 2 was a consistent presence across the awards circuit, its most significant win was at the NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Animated Motion Picture. Despite being an audience favorite, the general mindset seemed to be that Inside Out 2 already won the box office and Pixar didn’t need another Oscar for a franchise that had been well-compensated. It’d be the first time since the category’s creation that Disney lost three years in a row.
Memoir of a Snail was deemed a worthy successor to Adam Elliot’s Oscar-winning short Harvie Krumpet and the tragically overlooked feature Mary and Max. Speaking of tragedy, Elliot seamlessly blended the genre with absurd comedy, building to an unexpectedly heartwarming resolution. The Australian stop-motion film garnered eleven nominations at the AACTA Awards, winning Best Actress and Supporting Actress for Sarah Snook and Jackie Weaver’s voiceover work. Yet, Snail lost Best Film to Better Man, aka the Robbie Williams monkey movie. Snail seemed like the sort of film regional critics groups would shower with notices come award season. Although Snail picked up a few American accolades, Flow emerged as the favorite among critics.
A self-taught animator, Gints Zilbalodis made his first short Aqua in high school. Despite having no animation universities in his native Latvia, Zilbalodis continued to hone his craft. He single-handedly animated his feature film debut Away using the 3D graphics software Maya. Zilbalodis also wrote, edited, composed, and produced the film, essentially being its only credit. Although Away won the Contrechamp Award at Annecy and received an Annie nomination for Zilbalodis’ music, it wasn’t among the five Best Animated Feature finalists at the Oscars. Around the same time Away premiered, Zilbalodis entered development on Flow. This feline odyssey had been floating in Zilbalodis’ head since Aqua, which similarly followed a cat struggling to survive a perilous water world. This time, Zilbalodis assembled a small team, using the open-source software Blender.
The crew studied live animals for reference, including Zilbalodis’ cat and dog. Real animal sounds were used as well in an otherwise dialogue-free story. Although the film took five-and-a-half years to realize, Zilbalodis claims that much of that time was spent conceiving the story, finding funding, and slowly bringing a crew onboard. The actual production lasted less than a year, according to Zilbalodis. Opting not to use storyboards, Flow was designed directly in the computer, giving the characters and camera an almost improvised feel. Flow was finished mere days before its Cannes premiere, which was also the crew’s first experience watching the film with an audience. Zilbalodis felt like he had gone from one storm to another. It was far from over, as Flow got swept away in the award season flood.
Flow won Best Animated Feature at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards and New York Film Critics Circle Awards. Although LAFCA and NYFCC weren’t above awarding more commercial animated films like The Wild Robot, they’ve been known to gravitate toward indie fare. As such, few expected Flow’s wins to shake up the Oscar race. If LAFCA and NYFCC truly impacted Academy voters, I Lost My Body and Wolfwalkers might’ve overcome the so-called “Pixar mafia.” Still, it was hard to dismiss Flow’s presence throughout the season, winning several more critics awards by the time the Golden Globes came along.
Surely the Globes would be where The Wild Robot laid its claim. In addition to Best Animated Feature and Cinematic and Box Office Achievement, the Globes nominated Kris Bowers’ score and the song “Kiss the Sky.” Some outlets claimed that Wild Robot was the most-nominated animated film in Golden Globes history. That’s inaccurate, as Aladdin was nominated for five Globes, although three of those were for Best Original Song. Wild Robot was the first animated film to receive four Globe nominations in separate categories. While Wild Robot wasn’t expected to win in the three other categories, Best Animated Feature seemed preordained. When Harrison Ford announced Flow as the winner, awards experts could feel the trajectory changing.
Immediately, people had flashbacks to last year when Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron won the Globe, beating presumed frontrunner Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. While those two films divvied up awards throughout the season, Heron’s Globe upset ultimately foreshadowed its Oscar win. There were a few differences. Spider-Verse was a sequel to a film that already swept the awards circuit and another sequel was on the way. Although Miyazaki had a competitive Oscar for Spirited Away and an Honorary Academy Award, voters knew this might be the last opportunity to recognize the aging legend. Wild Robot wasn’t a sequel like Spider-Verse, but it had a legend at the helm like Heron.
Since the Globes created a category for animation, only four winners didn’t go on to win the Oscar. Cars (which lost to Happy Feet), The Adventures of Tintin (which wasn’t nominated), How to Train Your Dragon 2 (which lost to Big Hero 6), and Missing Link (which lost to Toy Story 4). Whether or not Flow would join those films, Zilbalodis, producer/co-writer Matīss Kaža, and producer Ron Dyens were celebrating. In a homage to Paul Giamatti, they followed up the Globe win with a trip to In-N-Out Burger. The Globe would be put on display at the Latvian National Museum of Art where hundreds waited in line to observe it. Flow was the first Latvia victory in Globes history. It brought Latvia to the Oscars for the first time as well.
Chewing an apple on his bed, a startled Zilbalodis pulled his dog Audrey in for a loving embrace when Flow was announced as an Oscar nominee for Best International Feature Film. Zilbalodis cuddled with Audrey again when Flow got into Best Animated Feature. Becoming Latvia’s first Oscar nominee, Flow overperformed with two bids. The Wild Robot also performed better than expected, attaining nominations for Bowers’ score and Best Sound (Randy Thom, Brian Chumney, Gary A. Rizzo, and Leff Lefferts). It was disappointing to see “Kiss the Sky” omitted from Best Song. Perhaps it split votes with the other animated songs that had been shortlisted: “Beyond” from Moana 2, “Tell Me It’s You” from Mufasa: The Lion King, and the title song from Piece by Piece.
Nevertheless, Wild Robot had one more Oscar nomination than Flow, meaning it wasn’t out of this race yet. Following a win at the Saturn Awards, Wild Robot rebounded at the Critics’ Choice Awards where Sanders accepted Best Animated Feature with producer Jeff Hermann and Roz the Robot herself, Lupita Nyong'o. Wearing a Roz pin on his jacket, Sanders gave an earnest speech thanking the other talents who brought him to the stage. Sanders also noted how long he’d been in the business, recalling storyboarding the Beast’s death and transformation. The following day, Hermann took home the PGA Award. If Wild Robot won the Oscar, Hermann would be Best Animated Feature’s fourth openly LGBTQ+ recipient.
While Wild Robot was making a comeback on the awards trail, Zilbalodis was crushing it online. Whenever Flow lost an award, the crew would go out for ice cream, which Zilbalodis posted on social media. Zilbalodis also shared behind-the-scenes details with users. Beyond Film Twitter, Zilbalodis attended screenings of Flow at Disney Animation, Sony Animation, Pixar, and Laika. Zilbalodis brushed more elbows at the Annie Awards where Flow won Best Animated Feature — Independent and Writing in an Animated Feature. The irony that a dialogue-free film won for writing wasn’t lost on Zilbalodis.
Although Flow won two Annies, Wild Robot wasn’t competitive in those categories. Wild Robot did win in all nine categories it got nominated for, including Best Animated Feature. This continued a trend at the Annies with one or two films dominating in almost every category. The only other feature that won an Annie that year was Despicable Me 4 for Habib Louati’s storyboards. Nevertheless, you could sense the love for Sanders in the room whenever he gave a moving acceptance speech. Even if some might’ve felt that Flow was the more ambitious film, this seemed like Sanders’ time.
Wild Robot won CCA, PGA, and the Annie, but so did Across the Spider-Verse. The true test would come at the BAFTAs where The Boy and the Heron triumphed the previous year. If Flow could win the BAFTA, it’d follow the exact same path. A functional Roz model greeted guests as they arrived at the BAFTAs. Roz spoke as well, commenting on how people dressed and calculating their odds of winning an award. In something of a surprise, Best Animated Feature didn’t go to Wild Robot or Flow, but Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl. The second Wallace & Gromit feature also won the newly created BAFTA for Best Children's & Family Film. Both categories were practically identical, except Kensuke’s Kingdom substituted Inside Out 2 in the family field.
Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham had been good sports that season, walking the red carpets with Wallace and Gromit production puppets yet rarely giving any speeches. If Vengeance Most Fowl was going to win anywhere, BAFTA made the most sense due to the franchise’s roots. Many wrote off the BAFTA wins as a British thing, but it also suggested that the Oscars might be a three-horse race. Almost two decades earlier, Cars won almost every precursor animation award. However, it lost the BAFTA to Happy Feet, which prevailed later at the Oscars. What did Happy Feet and Vengeance Most Fowl have in common? A penguin! Coincidence? Probably, but Wallace & Gromit had to be taken seriously, especially given Park’s Oscar track record and the magnetism of Feathers McGraw.
The film marked Feathers’ return after the Oscar-winning short The Wrong Trousers. This technically made Vengeance Most Fowl a sequel, which might come back to bite it at the Oscars. Park’s last major awards contender was the short A Matter of Loaf and Death, which won a BAFTA and Annie, but lost the Oscar to Logorama. With four Oscars to his name, there wasn’t an urgency to give Park a fifth. Despite the been there, done that mentality, Vengeance Most Fowl offered a relevant message about embracing advancing technology while being cautious of abusing that tech. The same could be said about Wild Robot.
Ironically, if Wild Robot claimed the Oscar, I’d be DreamWorks’ first Best Animated Feature win since Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. Of course, Were-Rabbit was a co-production with Aardman, which had since found a new distributor in Netflix. A homegrown DreamWorks film hadn’t won since the original Shrek. Assuming Vengeance Most Fowl was just a British thing, the BAFTA outcome seemingly leaned in Wild Robot’s favor. While Wild Robot didn’t win the Globe or BAFTA, neither did Toy Story 4 or Big Hero 6, the latter of which also starred a lovable robot. Toy Story 4, meanwhile, won the Oscar with just CCA and PGA. So could Wild Robot.
Of the televised awards, Flow had only beaten Wild Robot at the Globes. This was notably the second year that the Globes found themselves under new management in an effort to diversify the voting body. Between Heron and Flow, the Globes awarded two international animated features back-to-back, reflecting its changing leadership. The Oscars were growing more diverse as well, but voters still generally favored American animation. If Vengeance Most Fowl was a BAFTA thing, Flow might’ve been a Globes thing. What’s more, the Globes have 334 voting members, a fairly small number to win over. The Academy has almost 10,000, many with ties to DreamWorks and Universal Pictures. The Globe win significantly raised Flow’s profile, though, ensuring more eyes were on it. As much as some like to write them off as the poor man’s Oscar, the Globes still mattered.
Flow was feeling more and more like the little cat movie that could. As Oscar voters were marking their ballots, the film was made available to stream on Max. A 4K special edition Criterion release was also announced. Ads highlighted Wes Anderson, Guillermo del Toro, Bill Hader, Barry Jenkins, and Alexander Payne among the industry giants who championed the film. At the Independent Spirit Awards, Flow won Best International Film, a first for animation. Instead of ice cream, the Flow team grabbed Hot Dog on a Stick. In an ideal world, perhaps Flow could win the Oscar for Best International Feature while Wild Robot won Best Animated Feature, ensuring both teams got their moment. With Best Picture nominees Emilia Pérez and I’m Still Here in the International race, though, it seemed likely that either Flow or Wild Robot would leave empty-handed.
To an extent, Flow and Wild Robot couldn’t have been more different. One was produced for almost $80 million at one of the biggest animation studios in the world. The other was made for €3.5 million with several crew members, some of whom had never worked on a film before. One had its FYC campaign backed by an industry machine while the other campaigned via the director’s social media. One had zero dialogue. The animals talked in the other film, although they spoke in a timeless manner. Yet, the two films shared just as much in common. Both took inspiration from Studio Ghibli with Sanders seeking to paint a Miyazaki forest and Zilbalodis looking to the anime series Future Boy Conan.
Above all else, Flow and Wild Robot are about different species learning to co-exist in perilous environments. In Wild Robot, the primary threat is a fire, not unlike the ones that raged across California amid award season. In Flow, it’s a flood, not unlike the ones in Florida following Hurricane Milton. By the end, the animals realize just how integral community is to survival. Sanders learned a long time ago that animation is a collaborative medium. Much like how the cat in his movie is hesitant to seek companionship, Zilbalodis was used to working alone. Zilbalodis’ growth as an artist mirrored the cat’s journey, learning to value every crew member keeping this ship afloat. Even if there were no human characters, both of these relevant films overflowed with humanity.
There was a sense of comradery leading up to the Oscars as well. When Sanders accepted an Annie for The Wild Robot, he called the other animated films released that year “immense acts of talent and perseverance.” Sanders added, “More detailed work goes into these movies than in a lot of other films. The best gift I received is I got to meet Kelsey again, and Nick, Merlin, Adam, Gints, Morgan, Josh, and Shannon. And I understand what it’s like to look at a blank space and have to fill it with words and hope. Your films inspired and humbled me. I know what your crews did. We all do.”
It was such an honor to be on a panel with these legends! Kelsey Mann, Chris Sanders and Nick Park(!!) pic.twitter.com/3DGBBVNHzy
— Gints Zilbalodis (@gintszilbalodis) February 6, 2025
Sanders, Zilbalodis, Park, and Mann participated in a panel at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. Adam Elliot was unable to attend since he was at an award show in Australia. Zilbalodis posted a photo of the four together, calling his fellow nominees “legends.” While Zilbalodis may be on his way to achieving legendary status, he got his first Oscar nomination at age 30. If he won, he’d be the youngest director ever to win Best Animated Feature, breaking the previous record held by Andrew Stanton (38). Voters don’t always consider age, but when a legend like Sanders doesn’t have an Oscar, picking the new kid on the block is harder to justify.
Another potential strike against Flow was one of its most unique qualities: a lack of actors. The Actors Branch remains the Academy’s largest. Would they go for a movie with zero actors, especially when they had an alternative headlined by an Oscar-winning actress? Other dialogue-free films like The Red Turtle and Robot Dreams had been nominated before, but none of them won Best Animated Feature. On the other hand, the absence of dialogue made Flow more accessible to the entire voting body. It spoke a universal language, demonstrating the full power of the animation medium. If Flow pulled it off, it wouldn’t just be the category’s first dialogue-free winner. It’d be the first truly independent winner… debatably.
Some might argue that Boy and the Heron or even Spirited Away, the latter of which Disney distributed in the U.S., broke the glass ceiling for indie animation. Even with a smaller U.S. distributor like GKIDS, though, it feels weird calling Heron an underdog, especially since it was supposedly the most expensive Japanese film in history. A Flow win might mean the category as we’ve known it for more than two decades would never be the same. No longer would studio-driven features be the de facto frontrunners with indie animation lucky just to be nominated. Best Animated Short underwent a similar evolution. Once dominated by studio cartoons from Disney, MGM, Warner Bros., and UPA, Best Animated Short was opened to indies after John and Faith Hubley’s Moonbird won in 1960. While shorts from Disney and Pixar still get nominated, Best Animated Short is more about the indie and international artists now. Maybe Best Animated Feature was ready for a similar changing of the tide with Flow ushering in a new wave.
This wasn’t exactly a David vs. Goliath scenario either. Yes, The Wild Robot had a much larger budget and box office intake, grossing over $300 million worldwide. A strong haul for a post-pandemic release that isn’t a sequel, but Wild Robot didn’t do Frozen, Zootopia, or Coco numbers. Those films were too big to fail come Oscar time. Wild Robot didn’t spark a cultural phenomenon like Encanto or revolutionize the art form like Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse either. The film was beloved, which might’ve been enough to secure it a win a few years ago. With the Academy potentially moving toward more international and experimental animation, though, Wild Robot wasn’t undeniable.
Flow was becoming harder to deny. While the Academy had never awarded an animated feature like Flow, it was a much easier watch than some past international nominees like I Lost My Body and Flee. Where those films dealt with severed body parts and war, Flow centered on adorable animals. From Disney’s Feast to Pixar’s Piper, animal-centric stories had done well in Best Animated Short. Even if a voter wasn’t a cat person, chances are they were a dog, lemur, or capybara person. Flow could be viewed by all ages, although it didn’t talk down to audiences. In fact, it didn’t talk at all. Wild Robot had cute animals too. After seeing Flow, though, many asked if Wild Robot would’ve been more effective if the animals didn’t talk. Either way, Flow took a bigger swing.
After winning the César Award for Best Animated Film in France, the Flow team gathered at LA’s Venice Beach ahead of the Oscars. Commemorating how far their little film had come, the crew inflated a large cat balloon on the shore. They lifted the balloon into the heavens, calling to mind the film’s most abstract scene where the secretarybird rises to a place the cat can’t follow. The filmmakers showed up to the Oscars with their good luck charms. Zilbalodis arrived with cat cufflinks and an image of his black cat stitched inside his tuxedo. The Vengeance Most Fowl team walked the red carpet with formally dressed Wallace and Gromit models. Sanders donned his Roz pin while his wife Jessica Steele sported a foxy purse. Would Flow ascend to new heights, was The Wild Robot about to kiss the sky, or could Wallace and Gromit prove that penguins can fly?
Best Animated Feature was the second category announced with presenting duties falling to Andrew Garfield and Goldie Hawn. Although Hawn stuttered a little as she opened the envelope, everyone knew who won when an “F” sound emanated from her mouth. As Hawn said, “Flow,” the floodgates for independent animated features opened. They had also been opened for Latvia, turning the country’s first nomination into a win. While Flow was the most-watched film in Latvia’s history, it was also the lowest-grossing Best Animated Feature winner ever, ironically beating the highest-grossing. Inside Out 2 might not have won much this season, but in the spirit of that film, Flow’s triumph brought a wave of emotions for the whole animation community.
Most animation fans likely felt a mix of intense joy and a hint of sadness. Sadness that The Wild Robot laid a goose egg and Sanders was now the category’s most nominated director without a statuette. Sanders wasn’t retiring, having a sequel to The Wild Robot in development. He’d have other opportunities to win, but if this wasn’t his time, then when? Had the Academy missed the boat? At this point, nobody in the animation industry felt more overdue for an Honorary Oscar than Sanders. Some write off honorary awards as consolation prizes. Even if the Academy gave Sanders an Honorary Oscar, though, he could still win competitively down the line. Just ask Spike Lee and Paul Newman.
Sanders’ loss mirrored the Best Actress race where industry veteran Demi Moore lost to ingénue Mikey Madison. The latter’s director, Sean Baker, picked up four Oscars for Anora, tying Walt Disney’s record for the most wins in one evening. Baker’s speeches served as a battle cry for cinema, especially of the independent variety. AMPAS championed indies this year, recognizing other micro-budget films like The Brutalist, A Real Pain, and, of course, Flow. Since its inception, Best Animated Feature was one category the studio system had a firm grasp on. It’d be unfair to call these winners undeserving, as Pixar, Disney, and DreamWorks gave us some of the greatest animated features of the past 25 years. However, the indie scene has also delivered plenty of underseen masterpieces like Anomalisa, The Breadwinner, and Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, all of which settled from nominations. Flow signified a sea change.
As uplifting as it would’ve been to see Sanders finally win for his magnum opus, it was hard to feel anything less than joy as Zilbalodis hugged his colleagues. Even if Flow hadn’t won, it already went the distance. Now it had gone a step beyond. In addition to joy, there was excitement in the room for this small crew jumping out of their seats. Excitement for Blender, which got a shout-out in Zilbalodis’ speech. Excitement for the entire country of Latvia, which was officially on Hollywood’s radar and would celebrate Zilbalodis’ return home as if it were a national holiday. Excitement for Zilbalodis’ pets at home and animals around the world watching. Excitement for a future generation of animators who choose to skip film school, producing a labor of love with free software, next to no funds, limited distribution, no celebrity voice talent, no studio executives giving notes, no house style to abide by, no rules to follow… and ultimately winning an Oscar based on passion alone.
There’d be no ice cream on Oscar Night. Just another In-N-Out Burger and an email from Paul Giamatti reading, “CONGRATULATIONS!!! WONDERFUL!!! BEAUTIFUL!!! WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY.” Zilbalodis is already working on his next film, believing it’ll be finished much faster than Flow was. Whether or not it’s ready in time for next year’s Oscars, he’ll surely be back. This past awards season has not only changed Zilbalodis’ career, but potentially the entire animation industry. Echoing what Guillermo del Toro repeatedly said when Pinocchio swept the season, “Animation is ready for the next step.” Whatever happens going forward, Best Animated Feature has gone from a routinely easy category to predict to the wildest of wild cards.
And seriously, let’s work on getting Sanders that Honorary Oscar.
