Can A Robot Take Home Best Picture?

Can WALL-E Win Best Picture? WALL-E, Pixar's lonely little post-apocalyptic robot, is quickly collecting a lot of friends. Critics have applauded the animated film all the way to a 97% Fresh rating on the movie-review website Rotten Tomatoes -- the year's best so far. Audiences have spent $128 million at the box office in WALL-E's first 10 days of release, placing the film seventh so far in 2008, and it is likely to climb closer to the heroes of May -- Indiana Jones and Iron Man -- as glowing word-of-mouth continues to drive ticket sales. Even though most of Hollywood's Oscar contenders have yet to hit theaters, all that critical and commercial affection is leading awards watchers to ponder: Could WALL-E finally be The One? No animated film has ever won Best Picture. Only one -- Beauty and the Beast, in 1991 -- has even earned a nomination. Since the creation of a Best Animated Feature category seven years ago, animated film has been trapped in Oscar's cartoon ghetto, even though reviewers ... [link]