Every film genre has had its ups and downs throughout its history, and animated films are no different. Animated films have gone a long way from their inception in late 1800s France, particularly in the United States. Some adults may dismiss computer animated movies as immature, but happily, some creators have put their hearts into their work and demonstrated the influence animation can have on its audience.
Because of this disparity in inventiveness, some animated films have done little to advance the medium. Today, however, there are more works of art than disgraces. Disney animated films are difficult to rank, and not only because there are so many of them. These are films that mean so much to so many people, are inextricably tied to profound childhood experiences, and have influenced what many adults consider magical.
Ranking their individual merits and shortcomings becomes an exploration into why you liked everything as much as it does into their relative importance as a creative endeavor. So, we tried to differentiate the five best computer-animated feature films from the five worst computer-animated movies for adults of all time.
5 Best Computer-Animated Movies for Adults:
5. Best – Toy Story
- Release Date: 22 November 1995
- Director: John Lasseter
- IMDb Ratings: 8.3/10
About Toy Story:
The cinema industry created several methods to bring the most unbelievable characters and graphics to life, but everything changed following the release of Pixar’s Toy Story. The 3D technology utilized to produce the picture not only revolutionized animated films, but all subsequent films followed Pixar’s lead in employing CGI.
In 2000, Disney attempted to compete with Pixar with the film Dinosaur, while Dreamworks followed the CGI trend with the majority of their films. Most animated films today are 3D, but Toy Story was the first and most popular. Live-action films have gotten so used to the technology pioneered by Pixar that it has become a mainstream technology.
4. Best – Finding Nemo
- Release Date: 30 May 2003
- Director: Andrew Stanton
- IMDb Ratings: 8.2/10
About Finding Nemo:
Finding Nemo, produced by Pixar Animation Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures, has achieved unanimous praise. The animated movie won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and was nominated for three further awards, including Best Original Screenplay. Finding Nemo was the highest-grossing animated picture at the time and the second highest-grossing film in 2003, grossing $871 million globally.
Andrew Stanton directed Finding Nemo, which stars Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Willem Dafoe, and Alexander Gould. The picture, which captured the hearts of both adults and children, had the highest DVD sales of the decade until it was forced out of first place by Frozen (2013). There’s nothing wrong with ice princesses, but fish are simply cooler.
3. Best – Ratatouille
- Release Date: 29 June 2007
- Director: Brad Bird
- IMDb Ratings: 8.1/10
About Ratatouille:
Ratatouille is Pixar’s eighth feature, directed and co-written by Brad Bird. This animated film received an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature in 2007 after grossing $620.7 million at the box office. Janeane Garofalo, Patton Oswalt, Lou Romano, Ian Holm, and Peter O’Toole lend their voices to Ratatouille.
Critics praised the picture, rating it 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, but audiences were less satisfied, giving it an 87%. Bird wanted the animation to be perfect, so he worked with gourmet chefs from the United States and France. He also required the animators to take cooking training at San Francisco culinary schools.
The end product was a fantastic love tale with rats and some delicious cuisine. Ratatouille receives tremendous accolades for executing such a daring and original premise.
2. Best – Despicable Me
- Release Date: 6 August 2010
- Director: Pierre Coffin, Chris Renaud
- IMDb Ratings: 7.6/10
About Despicable Me:
Despicable Me, produced by Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment, made over $546 million worldwide on a $69 million budget. Its big office success prompted two sequels, as well as two Minion films. The film was directed by Chris Renaud (first feature film) and Pierre Coffin, and it was created by Mac Guff, a French animation company (later acquired by Illumination Entertainment).
Despicable Me featured a slew of big-name voices, including Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Jason Segel, Russell Brand, Will Arnett, Miranda Cosgrove, and Julie Andrews. Despite its immense popularity, reviewers and audiences rated it 81.5% on Rotten Tomatoes. Despicable Me received hundreds of nominations and won the Golden Globe for Best Animated Feature Film.
1. Best – Spirited Away
- Release Date: 20 July 2001
- Director: Hayao Miyazaki
- IMDb Ratings: 8.6/10
About Spirited Away:
By the early 2000s, everyone in the United States felt they understood what animation might be, but what viewers didn’t know is that there is an entire universe of tales to be told, and there are many different methods to tell them. Spirited Away by Studio Ghibli revolutionized animated cinema in a variety of ways.
In an era when this genre was restricted to cheerful entertainment for children, the Japanese classic made its Oscar debut, winning Best Animated Film in 2002, much to the surprise of most viewers. They were exposed to a darker, more symbolic approach to storytelling for all ages that hadn’t been seen since The Nightmare Before Christmas. It exposed Hayao Miyazaki’s talent to the United States and inspired a new generation of artists.
Adults and children alike may enjoy the finest animated films. No one sees the poorest animated films in particular. These films fail to capture the enchantment of an animated adventure, whether it’s due to poor visuals, a dull narrative, or a mix of the two. Some are even considered horror material.
5 Worst Computer-Animated Movies for Adults:
5. Worst – The Emoji Movie
- Release Date: 28 July 2017
- Director: Tony Leondis
- IMDb Ratings: 3.4/10
About The Emoji Movie:
This film will make you wish the term “emoji” never existed. It will make you desire the days when a hyphen and a pair of parentheses could indicate a wink. Those simpler times have long ago passed us by, and we now have this. The Emoji Film.
The narrative revolves around Gene Meh, a “meh” emoji that lives within an adolescent boy’s smartphone. Gene, on the other hand, can express himself in ways other than “meh,” which lands him in difficulty. In order to avoid being erased, Gene joins forces with a “high five” emoji and a “hacker” emoji (whatever that is).
Gene then embarks on an introspective trip that raises profound concerns such as: What does it mean to be happy? What exactly does it mean to be “meh”? Remember that this film comes from the same company that produced us Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. It doesn’t make sense.
4. Worst – Hoodwinked Too! Hood Vs. Evil
- Release Date: 9 April 2011
- Director: Mike Disa
- IMDb Ratings: 4.7/10
About Hoodwinked Too! Hood Vs. Evil:
The first Hoodwinked! is a long way from the Shrek-level film that The Weinstein Company envisioned, but it’s not bad. The animation is poor, but there’s enough witty banter and surprising turns to keep you entertained. Hoodwinked Too! shattered all expectations of Hoodwinked evolving into anything greater.
Hood versus Evil. The sequel failed to match the previous film’s low-budget charm and razor-sharp humor. Furthermore, it placed the characters in the center of a spy movie scenario that made no sense. It’s no surprise that Anne Hathaway dropped the role of Little Red Riding Hood, allowing Hayden Panettiere to replace the position.
3. Worst – Doogal
- Release Date: 2 February 2005
- Director: Frank Passingham, Dave Borthwick, Jean Duval
- IMDb Ratings: 5.2/10
About Doogal:
While it is known as The Magic Roundabout in France and the United Kingdom, the film’s English dub is called Doogal. Because Doogal was animated in another language, hardly any of the dialogue corresponds to the characters’ lip motions. But that’s not even the worst part.
The tale, which revolves around a hazy mythology about three magical stones, is utterly overshadowed by Doogal’s distracting shag hairdo. What were they thinking when they were making Doogal? The apparent answer is that Doogal is a poor man’s version of the canine character Dug from Pixar’s Up. However, Doogal debuted four years before Up.
What makes the English adaptation of Doogal so amazing is the truly incredible quantity of high-profile voices it has. Who is Chevy Chase? Check. Who is Whoopi Goldberg? Check. Jon Stewart, Jimmy Fallon, Sir Ian McKellan, Judi Dench, and John Krasinski? Check. At the very least, these performers were able to make a good living.
2. Worst- Norm of the North
- Release Date: 18 March 2016
- Director: Trevor Wall
- IMDb Ratings: 3.4/10
About Norm of the North:
If you assumed low-quality CGI pictures were extinct, Norm of the North is here to prove you wrong. Even in 2016, the year of Moana and Pete’s Dragon, a film as terrible as Norm of the North could receive a wide theatrical release. Rob Schneider plays Norm, a polar bear who is outcast by his Arctic pals because he can communicate with people.
One would assume that this ability would be advantageous in interacting with the region’s local people, but we rapidly find that it makes him a freak. Then Norm flies to New York City to become an actor, save his grandfather, and prevent a selfish businessman from transforming the Arctic into a tourist trap. Poor animation, a perplexing theme, and farting lemmings all contribute to Norm of the North being a bear-y terrible movie.
1. Worst – Shark Tale
- Release Date: 1 October 2004
- Director: Vicky Jenson, Rob Letterman, Bibo Bergeron
- IMDb Ratings: 6/10
About Shark Tale:
After Finding Nemo’s release by Disney Pixar in 2002, DreamWorks followed up with Shark Tale, a computer animated movie in 2003. Shark Tale, on the other hand, crashed out hard rather than riding Finding Nemo’s leftover wave of success. Shark Tale is derivative and rife with clichés, and it offers nothing new to audiences. And, for a film aimed mostly at children, there are a lot of Godfather allusions.
Perhaps those are for the grownups in the room. Adults, on the other hand, may readily watch The Godfather instead of a dubious cartoon spoof. So, who is this film intended for? But it’s not completely hopeless; the animation is good for 2003, and Martin Scorsese gives the show of his life as Sykes the pufferfish.
