Director Pete Docter — a member of Pixar Animation Studio’s so-called "brain trust" — won his second Oscar for Disney/Pixar’s juggernaut Inside Out on Sunday night. He previously won for 2009’s Up.
Inside Out’s producer Jonas Rivera won his first Academy Award for the film. (He also produced Up, but at that time the producer wasn’t included on the animated feature category ballot.)
"We are so lucky. Not just us, but everyone in this room, because, regardless of a gold man or not, we get to make stuff, " said Docter.
Rivera added: "Right, we do. And on this film, every single storyboard, every single frame, cut, line of dialogue, every single pixel, was done by the amazing artists we work with at Pixar, led by John Lasseter. They should be up here with us tonight. We love them. Along with our amazing cast — best cast ever assembled, animated or otherwise — we love you."
The win gave Pixar its eighth Oscar in the animated feature category, which was first awarded to films made during 2001. The studio previously won Academy Awards in the animated feature category for Up and Toy Story 3, which were also nominated for best picture, as well as Brave, Toy Story 3, Wall-E, Ratatouille, The Incredibles and Finding Nemo.
Sunday night's award also gave Pixar a win after a two-year absence from the category’s nominees list. It didn’t release a film during 2014 (The Good Dinosaur was scheduled and then moved to a 2015 release date), and its 2013 release, Cars 2, failed to make the cut.
In addition to his Oscar wins for directing Inside Out and Up, Docter earned Academy Award nominations for the screenplays of Inside Out, Up, Wall-E and Toy Story; for directing Monsters Inc. (alongside John Lasseter); and for animated short Mike’s New Car. Rivera had one prior nomination, best picture for Up.
A box-office hit (nearly $857 million worldwide) and critical success, the CG Inside Out goes inside the head of a young girl, where five different emotions — Joy, Anger, Disgust, Fear and Sadness — manage their 11-year-old. It was nominated alongside two stop-motion animated films — Paramount and Starburns Industries’ Charlie Kaufman-penned Anomalisa and Aardman Animation’s Shaun the Sheep Movie — and two hand-animated films from indie distributor GKIDS — Filme de Papel’s Boy and the World and Studio Ghibli’s When Marnie Was There.
Incidentally, previous Oscar winners in the animated feature competition (from studios other than Pixar) include none other than Mad Max: Fury Road director George Miller, who won an Oscar in 2006 for helming Happy Feet.
