Disney/Pixar’s Cars took top family film honors, Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest was voted the best movie and Fox’s The Simpsons took the award for TV animation on Tuesday night during the 33rd Annual People’s Choice Awards. The CBS network aired the broadcast, which honored fan favorites from the worlds of film, television and music.
By public Internet voting, viewers chose Cars from the 15 animated feature films that arrived in North American theaters this year in both wide and limited release. Starring the voices of Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Larry the Cable Guy and host of other celebrities, the CG-animated adventure-comedy about anthropomorphized automobiles was 2006’s top-grossing domestic toon release, though Fox’s Ice Age: The Meltdown earned more worldwide. Warner Bros.’ Happy Feet, another one of the year’s top earners, has taken the most awards from critics’ associations but apparently wasn’t quite as popular as Cars with the fans who voted online. Cars also just received the Golden Tomato Award for animation from rottentomatoes.com, a website that compiles critical opinions from various outlets and rates films as either ‘fresh’ or ‘rotten’ based on the number of positive reviews they receive. Cars got a 76% fresh rating, just nudging out Warner Bros.’ Happy Feet. The latter currently has a 77% fresh rating, but since the film opened late in the year, some of those favorable reviews weren’t counted in the 2006 frame.
In addition to winning Best Movie, the blockbuster Pirates sequel was named the top drama pic and garnered three awards for Johnny Depp, who took both Best Male Star and Best Male Action Star and shares the award for Best On-Screen Match-up with co-star Keira Knightley.
Despite tough competition from fellow fan favorites such as Fox’s own Family Guy, The Simpsons remains an awards-season favorite. The long-running show from creator/exec producer Matt Groening dominates the animation category among nominees in this year’s Writer’s Guild Awards, taking place in New York on Feb 11. In 2006, the series picked up its ninth Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program and is currently in its 18th season with no sign of stopping.
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