Acclaimed filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki earned his first Golden Globe Award nomination on the strength of his semi-autobiographical fantasy film The Boy and the Heron, capping a big week for the film that this weekend opened to a record-breaking $12.8 million, becoming the first original anime title in history to top the North American box office.
The Boy and the Heron was nominated for the animated feature Golden Globe alongside Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, Elemental, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Suzume and Wish. Both The Boy and the Heron and Spider-Verse received additional nominations for original motion picture score.
A year after Netflix won the animated feature Golden Globe for the first time, for Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, the streamer was shut of out this year’s race despite a slate of contenders that included Nimona, the fantasy based on the graphic novel by ND Stevenson; Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget from Wallace & Gromit studio Aardmann; and Adam Sandler-starring Leo. Other studios shut out of this race include Dreamworks Animation, whose titles this year included Trolls World Tour. The studio has 11 prior noms and one win.
In the animated feature category, a win for Japan-set The Boy and the Heron would mark several firsts — the first Golden Globe Award for Miyazaki, for his Studio Ghibli, for U.S. distributor GKIDS, and the first animated feature that wasn’t made in the English language.
Nominee Suzume, a coming-of-age fantasy set in modern day Japan, also was not made in the English language and marks the first nomination for writer/director Makoto Shinkai (Your Name. Weathering with You). It was distributed by Toho and its U.S. distributor is Crunchyroll/Sony Pictures Releasing.
A trophy for Spider-Verse would make it the third sequel to win this category since it was first presented in 2006 (the others being Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon 2) and the second win for Sony Pictures Animation, following Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which won the category in 2018. Peter Lord and Christopher Miller again led the project as writers/producers, and the movie was helmed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Justin K. Thompson and Kemp Powers (who co-directed the 2021 winner of this category, Pixar’s Soul).
Disney’s Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios have long dominated this category and were again nominated for Elemental and Wish, respectively. Elemental — a story in which fire, water, land and air elements live together — is the 17th category nom for Pixar (it has won nine times) and the second for director Peter Sohn, who was previously nominated for a Golden Globe for The Good Dinosaur. Musical Wish is the 13th animated feature nom for Disney Animation (it has won the category three times), though its promoted songs including “This Wish” and “I’m a Star” were snubbed in the Globes’ original song race. Wish was directed by Chris Buck, who previously won a Golden Globe for Frozen, and Fawn Veerasunthorn.
Rounding out the category nominees is the biggest animated movie of the year, The Super Mario Bros. Movie from Minions studio Illumination Entertainment and Universal. Based on the Nintendo video game franchise, Super Mario has brought in a whopping $1.36 billion at the worldwide box office. It’s helmed by first-time nominees Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic.
Golden Globes producer Dick Clark Productions is owned by Penske Media Eldridge, a joint venture between Penske Media Corporation and Eldridge that also owns The Hollywood Reporter.
