Oscar special: Best animated feature — A battle of unlikely heroes

What if toys could talk? Do ogres have feelings? Can a dad swim halfway round the world braving sharks, jellyfishes and whatnot to save his son?

Some of the best animated films have given character to objects or animals and put them in settings that can’t be explored in real life. In that sense, Rango stands out among this year’s nominees for the Best Animated Feature. What sort of adventures do the animals of the desert go on? You know, those crawling reptiles that subsist on, well, anything. Rango is anything but cute, cuddly, smart or brave. When the movie started, I couldn’t connect with Rango, the way I did with Po (Kung Fu Panda), Nemo (Finding Nemo), Lightning McQueen (Cars) or even Shrek. But by the end, I cheered for him and his companions, and looked beyond the rough scales of the iguana, horned toad and the armadillo.

To be honest, Kung Fu Panda 2 entertained me more easily. But it didn’t immerse me in Gongmen City the way I was immersed in Mojave desert. What sealed it for me was the chase sequence in Rango — a classic scene from a Western, made even better in animation. The heroes are on a cart with precious cargo. Bandits giving them chase, riding on bats. Verbinski’s imagination comes to the fore, as Rango is swept up a lasso and through a series of comical errors brings down the bandits. The cartwheel chase in Kung Fu Panda 2 is brilliant in its own way, but not hard-hitting like the one in Rango.

From unlikely heroes we move to cats. Two of the other contenders have cats playing title roles. Puss In Boots is a film typical of a Shrek franchise. There are plenty of fairy tale creatures around — from Puss’s friend Humpty Dumpty to evil siblings, Jack & Jill. The humour certainly is better than some of the Shrek movies that followed the original.

Far from the sophisticated graphics of the films mentioned so far, A Cat In Paris is sweet French film employing simple graphics to tell the story of Zoe and her cat Dino. By day, Dino cuddles around Zoe, by night, he assists Nico, a master thief with a good heart. The other person in Zoe’s life is Jeanne, her mom and a police officer. The villain is Victor Costa, a delusional maniac who is after an antique statue. Costa is also the one who murdered Zoe’s father. All their paths cross due to the cat: the cat follows Nico, Zoe follows the cat, Costa’s gang follow Zoe, and are in turn pursued by Jeanne. Costa’s bumbling mates provide the laughs, while the plot itself is gripping with enough twists and turns.

I’ve saved Chico And Rita for the last since it is expected to spring a surprise by taking the Oscar. The film begins in Havana, Cuba in the late ’40s. It tells the story of Chico, an upcoming pianist and the sexy Rita, a singer. The two fall in love, become a smash hit and are drawn to New York. Here Rita becomes a celeb, while Chico is merely recognised as an important pianist in jazz circles. But Chico and Rita is more than just a love story. The people lending music and voice such as Bebo Valdes and Idiana Valdes are celebs in their own right. It also documents a period when Latino music started influencing jazz in America. Real-life music celebrities of the period such as Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonius Monk and Chano Pozo are characters in the film. Also making cameo appearances are Charlie Parker and Marlon Brando.

The characters, the setting, and the music help this films succeed as a fictional story as well as a documentary on Cuban music.

The contenders
Rango, directed by Gore Verbinski
Kung Fu Panda 2, directed by Jennifer Yuh Nelson
Chico and Rita, directed by  Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal
A Cat In Paris, directed by Alain Gagnol and Jean-LoupFelicioli
Puss in Boots, directed by Chris Miller