‘Inside Out’ Primed for March to Best Picture Oscar
Inside Out, from Disney’s Pixar division – generally regarded as the animated film of the year – is unlikely to be ignored by Hollywood when the Oscars roll around.
The insanely sweet film, in which a girl’s emotions struggle to deal with looming adolescence, set box office records earlier this summer. Inside Out crossed the global $600 million mark and more recently cleared $300 million internationally. And it just reclaimed the No. 1 spot in the U.K., Spain and Hong Kong after four weeks in theatres.
And look for the bucks to keep rolling in as Disney prepares the DVD release of Inside Out, complete with a brand new short called “Riley’s First Date.”
Deadline.com’s Pete Hammond pegged Inside Out as the front-runner to win Best Picture at the 2015 Oscars. Only three animated films – Shrek, Up and Toy Story 3 have even scored Best Picture nominations since the creation of the Animated Feature category.
But Inside Out is not only a shoe-in to win Best Animated Feature, it could actually win the coveted Best Picture of the Year. Inside Out is not a just a sweet movie, Hammond writes, it’s credited with opening up discussion about child psychology and improving parent-tween relations.
In other words, it has an Oscar winner must have: gravitas.
IndieWire counts Inside Out as one of three “safe bets” to win Best Picture, the others being Brooklyn and Carol, both of which are slated for Thanksgiving releases.
The British Independent also picks Inside Out as a possible Oscar winner, noting the so-called children’s film “succeeds in appealing to viewers of all ages, from under-10s to adults brushing up on Freudian displacement.”
The Inside Out DVD is slated for November release, but attendees of Disney’s D23 conference were treated to a screening “Riley’s First Date?”
The plot involves Riley meeting up with a boy to go skating and her parents’ emotions’ reactions to the first date. Dad’s emotions go into overdrive as Dad is overprotective of Riley, while Mom tried to act cool and get some girl time with Riley. The short boasts all of the voice actors from the feature film.
Internationally, Inside Out still has yet to open in Italy (Sept. 16), Germany (Oct. 1) and China (rumored but not certain for Oct. 8). So far Inside Out has fared best in Mexico ($30.6 million), Korea ($27.2 million), Australia ($22.3 million), Russia (where it was No. 2 Disney release ever, behind Frozen) and the U.K. ($26.6 million).
