Disney has been a clear winner at the box office this year. Not only will the company haul in more than $10 billion globally from movie ticket sales this year, it's also already the top contender for next year's award season.

On Monday, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association revealed that Disney was nominated for three of the five slots it had allotted for the best animated feature category.

"Toy Story 4," "Frozen II" and "The Lion King" are in the running for the prize against "Missing Link" and "How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World."

There's only one hitch — Disney does not consider "The Lion King" film to be an animated feature. The company, instead, classifies it as live action, although all but one shot from the film was rendered digitally.

Disney did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment.

"I don't think of it as animated," Doug Stone, president of Box Office Analyst, said. "I think of animated as a cartoon. I also don't think 'Lion King' is live-action. It's just a different animal."

And Stone isn't the only one questioning where "The Lion King" fits.

While "The Lion King" was created digitally, all of the characters and sets were built in a computer, the intention was for the film to look as real as possible. It was the same technology and under the same direction as "The Jungle Book."

Only this time around there were no humans to anchor the story in reality. Instead, the only live shot is the first one. Director Jon Favreau revealed in July that the opening shot of "The Circle of Life" is the only moment of the film that wasn't created by the animators.