ANIMATED features from Spain to Russia, France to Catalan have made this year’s nominations list for the 2020 European Film Awards (EFA) in the animated feature category.

“Klaus,” a holiday fairytale from Spanish directors Sergio Pablos and Carlos Martínez López, is the clear frontrunner in what is always a hotly contested award. The film, Netflix’s first original animated feature, picked up an Oscar nomination earlier this year.

Other 2020 EFA animated contenders include Rémy Chayé’s “Calamity,” a family-friendly tale set in the American West in 1863, and “Josep,” from director Aurel, a biographical piece about a dying gendarme who recalls a fateful encounter with Catalan artist Josep Bartoli, who he met at a French concentration camp after the Spanish Civil War.

“The Nose or the Conspiracy” of Mavericks, director Andrey Khrzhanovsky’s animated look at the mistakes of the 20th century, inspired by Nikolai Gogol’s novella “The Nose,” and Dmitri Shostakovich’s opera of the same name, is a dark horse candidate for the EFA honor.

The 3,800 members of the European Film Academy will vote on this year’s winner, which will be announced at a virtual ceremony Dec. 12.

(SD-Agencies)