Paramount Pictures ‘Rango’ took top honors as the Best Animated Feature at the 39th Annual Annie Awards, Saturday, February 4, at UCLA’s Royce Hall. With the expanded list of categories from 25 to 28, and the addition of two new categories – Editing and Best Animated Special Production - this year’s show honored more nominees than in the past.

The newly created ‘Member’s Favorite’ award voted on by the entire ASIFA-Hollywood community also went to ‘Rango.’ Newcomer Minkyu Lee’s ‘Adam and Dog’ won for Best Short Subject while Psyop’s Twinings ‘Sea’ was selected Best Television Commercial. ‘The Simpsons’ took Best Animated TV Production and Shadow Planet Production’s ‘Insanely Twisted’ was selected as Best Video Game.

‘This was a great evening, with a lot of fun and surprises,” said ASIFA-Hollywood President Frank Gladstone.  “Annies went to a huge variety of individuals and studios. This goes directly to ASIFA-Hollywood’s vision of celebrating the best in animation across project, studio and geographic boundaries.”

Actor and comedian Patton Oswalt’s hosting duties kept the show moving at a lively pace.  He was joined on stage by animation luminaries, celebrity presenters and comedic talent including animation legend June Foray, J.K. Simmons, Judy Greer, Zachary Levi, Peter Baynham, Mace Heufeld, Weird Al Yankovic, Bruce Boxleitner, Ahmed Best, Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Jim Cummings, Phil Lamarr, Diedrich Bader, Daran Norris, Tara Strong, Kelly Stables, Dee Bradley Baker, Nika Futterman, Ariel Winter, Logan Grove, James Hong, Brian Posehn, Greg & Evan Spiridellis and Jim Meskimen (Jib Jab), Bridgit Mendler,Brittany Snow, Jason Marsden and Joe Letteri.

Honored with the Winsor McCay award were Walt Peregoy, Borge Ring and the late Ronald Searle. The Winsor McCay Award stands as one of the highest honors given to an individual in the animation industry in recognition for career contributions to the art of animation.

Art Leonardi was honored with the June Foray award which is presented to an individual who has given significant and benevolent contributions to the art and industry of animation.

Often a predictor of the annual Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, the Annie Awards honor overall excellence as well as individual achievement in a total of 28 categories ranging from best feature, production design, character animation, and effects animation to storyboarding, writing, music, editing and voice acting.

Entries submitted for consideration were from productions that originally aired, were exhibited in an animation festival or commercially released between January 1, 2011 and December 31, 2011.

Image Courtesy of   https://www.facebook.com/Rango.lefilm

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Paramount Pictures announced it ended 2011 in the No. 1 position among all studios, having achieved the highest total combined gross of any studio for the year, earning a record $5.17 billion worldwide. The studio, which released a total of 16 new releases domestically this year, placed first in the North American market share with $1.96 billion, while also amassing record grosses at the international box office with $3.21 billion.

“This achievement reflects the combined efforts of our entire team across the globe and the careful process by which we select the projects and partners we believe in,” said Paramount Pictures Chairman & CEO Brad Grey. “We produce pictures that aspire to entertain audiences around the world, while at the same time we have sought to find innovative ways to reach movie-goers in this changing entertainment environment.

“This year our studio reached some key milestones, including the release of three vibrant Paramount franchise pictures and our first original CGI animated film. Our studio had its first ever $1 billion worldwide grossing film in Michael Bay’s hit ‘Transformers: Dark of the Moon’; we successfully re-launched our ‘Mission Impossible’ franchise with Tom Cruise, JJ Abrams and Brad Bird; our latest installment in the ‘Paranormal Activity’ franchise had another $100 million dollar success; our first original animated film ‘Rango,’ from director Gore Verbinski, earned rave reviews and more than $100 million at the domestic box office; and  we released global phenomenon ‘Super 8,’ directed by JJ Abrams, who will now direct the newest ‘Star Trek’ for 2013. We also benefited from our distribution partnerships with DreamWorks Animation and Marvel and I want to thank them both.”

“Film President Adam Goodman and his team in production and development, and Vice Chairman Rob Moore and his team in marketing and distribution, did outstanding work and truly delivered. As we prepare to celebrate Paramount’s 100th year in 2012, we are all grateful to be part of this wonderful institution as it continues to prosper,” added Grey.

In 2012, Paramount’s release slate highlights include ‘World War Z,’ a zombie thriller starring Brad Pitt and directed by Marc Forster, ‘G.I. Joe: Retaliation,’ the next installment in the global franchise starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Channing Tatum, a new chapter in the ‘Paranormal Activity’ franchise, and ‘The Dictator,’ starring Sacha Baron Cohen and directed by Larry Charles, the team behind ‘Borat.’

The 2011 box office results seen from the studio were built on a wide reaching range of titles, including the following (with current domestic grosses): ‘True Grit’ ($85 mil this year, $171.2 million total), Ivan Reitman’s ‘No Strings Attached’ ($70.7 mil), Jon Chu’s ‘Justin Bieber: Never Say Never’ ($73 mil), Gore Verbinski’s ‘Rango’  ($123.5 mil), Marvel Studio’s ‘Thor’ ($181 mil), DreamWorks Animation’s ‘Kung Fu Panda 2’ ($165.2 mil), JJ Abrams ‘Super 8’  ($127 mil), Michael Bay’s ‘Transformers:  Dark of the Moon’ ($352.4 mil), Marvel Studio’s ‘Captain America: The First Avenger’  ($176.7 mil), Craig Brewer’s ‘Footloose’ ($51.7 mil), the third installment in the hit ‘Paranormal Activity’ franchise ($104 mil), DreamWorks Animation’s ‘Puss In Boots’ ($145.8 mil), Sundance prize-winner ‘Like Crazy’ ($3.4 mil), Martin Scorsese and GK Films’ ‘Hugo’ ($50.2 mil), Jason Reitman’s ‘Young Adult’ ($12.8 mil), Brad Bird’s ‘Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol’ ($142.8 mil) and Steven Spielberg’s ‘Tintin’ ($51.4 mil).

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