Animation Movies

1988 · Isao Takahata · 89 min · Animation, Drama, War

Grave of the Fireflies is one of the most devastating films ever made, an anti-war masterpiece that uses animation to tell a story too painful for any other medium.

2018 · Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman · 117 min · Animation / Action

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse took a character audiences thought they knew inside out and found something completely new to say about him. It built a visual language that no animated film had attempted before, grounded it in a coming-of-age story with real emotional weight, and delivered one of the best superhero films in a genre that was already overflowing with them. A handful of side characters deserved more screen time and the villain could have been sharper, but those are footnotes in a film that won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and convinced millions of people that animation could redefine what a comic book movie looks like.

2001 · Hayao Miyazaki · 125 min · Animation / Fantasy

Spirited Away is one of those rare films that earns every bit of its reputation. Hayao Miyazaki built a world so vivid and strange that it feels like stepping into someone else's dream, and then he grounded the whole thing in a story about a scared kid learning to be brave. A small number of viewers bounce off the loose narrative structure or find themselves confused by the spirit world's unexplained rules, but the overwhelming majority walk away calling it one of the best animated films ever made. It won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature for a reason, and twenty-five years later, nothing in animation has quite replicated what it does.

1991 · Gary Trousdale, Kirk Wise · 84 min · Animation, Musical, Romance

Beauty and the Beast is the crown jewel of the Disney Renaissance, a nearly flawless musical that earned its historic Best Picture nomination through sheer craft and emotional power.

1999 · Brad Bird · 86 min · Animation / Sci-Fi

Brad Bird made a film about a boy and a giant robot that manages to be funnier, smarter, and more emotionally devastating than most live-action dramas twice its length. The animation is gorgeous, the voice cast nails every beat, and the story asks questions about identity and choice that resonate with adults just as powerfully as they do with children. A thin villain and a predictable structure are real flaws, but they barely register against everything the film gets right. This is one of those rare movies that was ignored when it mattered and then slowly, stubbornly proved the world wrong.

2015 · Pete Docter, Ronnie del Carmen · 95 min · Animation / Comedy

Inside Out is Pixar firing on all cylinders, taking a high-concept premise about the emotions inside a child's head and turning it into something that hits harder than most live-action dramas. The world-building is endlessly inventive, the voice cast is perfectly matched to their roles, and the central message about the necessity of sadness lands with a force that catches most viewers off guard. A few criticisms stick, mainly that Riley herself feels underwritten and that the adventure plot follows a familiar path, but those feel like small complaints against a film that won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature and left entire theater audiences in tears. It's one of those rare animated films that earns its emotional payoff honestly.

1994 · Roger Allers, Rob Minkoff · 88 min · Animation / Drama

The Lion King earns its place among the greatest animated films ever made through sheer force of craft. Hans Zimmer's score and the Elton John songs give it a musical foundation that few animated movies have matched. The animation remains stunning, the voice cast is perfectly chosen, and Mufasa's death still hits like a freight train no matter how many times you've seen it. The second half can't quite sustain the brilliance of what comes before, and Simba's journey back to responsibility happens faster than it probably should. None of that keeps this from being the kind of movie that shapes how people think about animation for the rest of their lives.

1995 · John Lasseter · 81 min · Animation / Comedy

Toy Story took a massive creative gamble and won so completely that it reshaped an entire industry overnight. The first fully computer-animated feature film still works thirty years later because Pixar built it on a foundation of sharp writing, perfect voice casting, and a story about friendship and jealousy that connects on a gut level. The animation has aged and the plot is simpler than what the studio would go on to produce, but 81 minutes of this much charm, humor, and heart is hard to argue with. It launched a franchise, launched a studio, and proved that animated films could be just as smart and emotionally honest as anything made for adults.

2008 · Andrew Stanton · 98 min · Animation / Sci-Fi

WALL-E is one of Pixar's finest achievements, a film that communicates more through beeps and gestures than most movies manage with pages of dialogue. Its first act is a near-perfect piece of visual storytelling, and the love story at its center is among the most emotionally affecting romances in animation. The spaceship sequences don't quite match the brilliance of those early Earth scenes, and a few elements land with less nuance than the rest. But the highs here are so high that the dips barely register in the final accounting. It won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, and almost two decades later, nothing in animation has told a better love story with fewer words.

2022 · Joel Crawford · 102 min · Animation, Adventure, Comedy

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is the best DreamWorks film since How to Train Your Dragon, a visually revolutionary and emotionally mature adventure about mortality, identity, and the courage to keep living.

2024 · Gints Zilbalodis · 85 min · Animation / Adventure

Flow is an 85-minute animated film with no dialogue, no humans, and no explanations, and it out-emotions almost everything the big studios released the same year. A solitary black cat navigates a world swallowed by a great flood, sharing a drifting sailboat with a capybara, a lemur, a dog, and a wounded bird, and the film trusts animal behavior and gorgeous imagery to carry everything. Made by a tiny Latvian team in free software, it won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature over giants. The story stays simple and the ending invites debate, and neither dents its quiet magic.

2001 · Pete Docter · 92 min · Animation, Comedy, Adventure

Pixar's most purely inventive concept gets a flawless execution, blending a buddy comedy, a workplace satire, and a surprisingly tender father-daughter story into one irresistible package.

2010 · Dean DeBlois, Chris Sanders · 98 min · Animation, Adventure, Fantasy

How to Train Your Dragon is DreamWorks' masterpiece, a thrilling and emotionally rich adventure built on one of the great friendships in animated film.

1992 · Ron Clements, John Musker · 90 min · Animation, Musical, Adventure

Aladdin is a crown jewel of the Disney Renaissance, powered by Robin Williams' legendary turn as the Genie and a soundtrack that remains iconic decades later.

1993 · Henry Selick · 76 min · Animation

The Nightmare Before Christmas is a visual and musical triumph that turned a quirky stop-motion experiment into one of the most beloved animated films ever made. Jack Skellington's identity crisis resonates across generations, and Danny Elfman's songs are permanently lodged in popular culture.

2016 · Travis Knight · 101 min · Animation

Kubo and the Two Strings is Laika's most visually ambitious and emotionally profound film, a stop-motion epic that treats its young audience with extraordinary respect. The storytelling is bravely melancholy, the animation sets records, and the themes of memory, loss, and storytelling itself give it a depth that few animated films achieve.

2009 · Henry Selick · 100 min · Animation

Coraline is stop-motion animation at its most ambitious and unsettling, a dark fairy tale that respects its young audience enough to genuinely frighten them. Henry Selick and Laika crafted a visual masterpiece that improves with every viewing and has aged into one of the greatest animated films of the century.

2023 · Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson · 140 min · Animation / Action

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse expands on its predecessor's visual revolution with animation so ambitious that each universe has its own art style, creating a film that looks like nothing else in cinema. Miles Morales' struggle between destiny and choice drives a narrative that's more emotionally complex than most live-action superhero films, and the action sequences push animation into territory that live-action physically cannot follow. The cliffhanger ending is the film's most divisive choice, leaving a complete emotional arc unresolved for a sequel.

2017 · Lee Unkrich, Adrian Molina · 105 min · Animation / Fantasy / Comedy-Drama

Coco is Pixar operating at something close to full power, using the studio's technical brilliance and emotional precision to tell a story about family, memory, and what it means to truly disappear. The cultural authenticity gives it a specificity that most animated films lack, and the final act delivers the kind of gut-punch that Pixar has built its reputation on. A somewhat predictable villain reveal and a few too many familiar story beats keep it just short of the studio's absolute peak. But when Miguel sings to his great-grandmother in that final scene, none of that matters. You'll be too busy trying to hold it together.

2003 · Andrew Stanton · 100 min · Animation / Adventure / Comedy-Drama

Finding Nemo remains one of Pixar's finest achievements, a film that works as a colorful underwater adventure for kids and a surprisingly affecting meditation on parenthood and letting go for everyone else. Dory alone is worth the price of admission. The episodic structure keeps it from building the kind of sustained momentum that Pixar's very best films manage, and a few of the supporting characters fade into the background. But the emotional core, a terrified father learning that love means giving his kid room to fail, hits just as hard on the twentieth viewing as it did on the first.

2007 · Brad Bird · 111 min · Animation / Comedy

Ratatouille is Pixar operating at peak confidence, telling a story about a rat who wants to cook and somehow making it one of the most thoughtful animated films about creativity ever produced. The animation is stunning, Paris has never looked this good in any medium, and Anton Ego's climactic scene remains one of the most powerful moments in Pixar's entire catalog. Linguini is a bit of a blank slate and the romance never fully lands, but everything surrounding those weak spots is so assured and so smart that they barely register. It won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and earned over $620 million worldwide, and close to two decades later, it still holds up beautifully.

2014 · Tomm Moore · 93 min · Animated Fantasy

A quietly devastating animated film about grief, family, and Irish mythology that proves you don't need spectacle to create something profoundly moving.

2020 · Pete Docter · 100 min · Animation, Comedy, Drama

Pixar's most philosophically ambitious film asks what makes life worth living and arrives at an answer so simple and so true that it catches you off guard.

1984 · Hayao Miyazaki · 117 min · Animation, Adventure, Sci-Fi

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind is the film that launched Miyazaki's career and Studio Ghibli itself, an ecological epic whose themes have only grown more urgent with time.

2009 · Wes Anderson · 87 min · Animation, Comedy, Adventure

Fantastic Mr. Fox is Wes Anderson's most purely enjoyable film, a stop-motion heist comedy that translates Roald Dahl's anarchic energy into Anderson's meticulously crafted visual world.

2004 · Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury, Conrad Vernon · 93 min · Animation, Comedy, Adventure

Shrek 2 is that rare sequel that improves on its predecessor, expanding the world and deepening the comedy while introducing the scene-stealing Puss in Boots.

2007 · Marjane Satrapi, Vincent Paronnaud · 96 min · Animated Drama

A fiercely personal and visually bold animated autobiography that captures the experience of growing up during revolution with humor, anger, and unflinching honesty.

2016 · Ron Clements, John Musker · 107 min · Animation, Musical, Adventure

Lin-Manuel Miranda's infectious soundtrack and a fierce, self-determined heroine carry this gorgeous Pacific Island adventure to the upper tier of Disney's modern era.

2002 · Dean DeBlois, Chris Sanders · 85 min · Animation, Comedy, Sci-Fi

Lilo & Stitch is Disney at its most emotionally honest, wrapping a genuine story about broken families and belonging inside a wildly entertaining alien comedy.

1989 · Hayao Miyazaki · 103 min · Animation, Adventure, Comedy

Kiki's Delivery Service is a gentle, deeply felt coming-of-age story about creative burnout and self-discovery that resonates even more with adult viewers than with children.

2009 · Pete Docter, Bob Peterson · 96 min · Animation / Adventure

A film defined by the best ten minutes Pixar has ever produced, followed by an adventure that never quite reaches the same height. That opening sequence earns its place among the most emotionally powerful moments in animation, and the score alone justifies watching it twice. The adventure half is fun, colorful, and occasionally thrilling, even if it settles into more familiar territory. What saves the whole thing is Carl's emotional arc, which gives the action real stakes and real heart. It's a very good movie that happens to contain a great one inside it.

2001 · Andrew Adamson, Vicky Jenson · 90 min · Animation, Comedy, Adventure

Shrek is a gleefully irreverent fairy tale parody that turned the genre inside out while sneaking in a surprisingly sweet story about self-acceptance.

1998 · Tony Bancroft, Barry Cook · 87 min · Animation, Musical, Action

Mulan stands out in the Disney canon for its war-movie stakes and a heroine who earns her place through grit and intelligence rather than magic or romance.

2008 · Mark Osborne, John Stevenson · 92 min · Animation, Action, Comedy

Kung Fu Panda is a beautifully animated martial arts film that takes its action and its philosophy seriously while never losing its sense of humor.

2014 · Dean DeBlois · 102 min · Animation, Adventure, Fantasy

How to Train Your Dragon 2 expands the scope of the original with darker stakes and genuine emotional weight, even if the bigger canvas comes at the cost of some intimacy.

2013 · Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee · 102 min · Animation, Musical, Fantasy

Frozen earned its cultural dominance through a genuinely great soundtrack, a powerful sister-love story that subverts fairy tale romance, and 'Let It Go,' which became the most inescapable song of the decade.

1940 · James Algar, Samuel Armstrong, Ford Beebe, Norman Ferguson, David Hand, Jim Handley, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, Bill Roberts, Paul Satterfield, Ben Sharpsteen · 125 min · Animation, Musical, Fantasy

Fantasia is Disney's most daring and artistically ambitious film, a marriage of classical music and animation that remains unlike anything else in the studio's catalog.

1986 · Hayao Miyazaki · 124 min · Animation, Adventure, Sci-Fi

Castle in the Sky is Studio Ghibli's rousing debut feature, a grand adventure packed with chases, robots, and Miyazaki's signature blend of wonder and environmental conscience.

2010 · Tom McGrath · 95 min · Animation / Comedy

Megamind is the superhero satire that arrived a decade early, a 2010 DreamWorks comedy about a supervillain who finally wins and discovers that victory without an opponent is just unemployment with a lair. Will Ferrell's blue-headed Megamind deconstructs destiny, branding, and the hero-villain codependency years before the genre's self-examination became an industry, and the film's cult rehabilitated it from underperformer to underrated classic with unusual unanimity. The animation shows its budget tier and the first act leans on formula before the inversion kicks in. Once it kicks, the film never stops being smarter than its poster.

1992 · Hayao Miyazaki · 94 min · Animation, Adventure, Comedy

Porco Rosso is Miyazaki's most personal and idiosyncratic film, a laid-back love letter to aviation, Italy, and the stubborn dignity of refusing to change.

2024 · Kelsey Mann · 96 min · Animation, Comedy, Drama

Inside Out 2 finds fresh territory by introducing Anxiety as Riley's dominant emotion during puberty, delivering a powerful message about self-acceptance that resonates even if the sequel can't quite match the original's revolutionary brilliance.

2021 · Jared Bush, Byron Howard · 102 min · Animation, Musical, Fantasy

Encanto's exploration of family pressure and generational trauma resonates deeply, powered by Lin-Manuel Miranda's best Disney soundtrack and a visual design so rich you could pause any frame and hang it on a wall.

2009 · Phil Lord, Christopher Miller · 90 min · Animation / Comedy

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs took a slim picture book and detonated it into one of the funniest animated films of its decade, a joke-a-second disaster comedy about a machine that makes it rain food, and the debut that announced Phil Lord and Christopher Miller as comedy's next great directing team. The gag density is absurd, the food-weather spectacle commits completely, and under the spaghetti twisters sits a sincere story about a father who can't say what he means. It's frenetic by design and thin in spots between the punchlines. As pure comedy per minute, almost nothing in the genre outdelivers it.

2014 · Don Hall, Chris Williams · 102 min · Animation, Action, Adventure

Big Hero 6 pairs an irresistible robot companion with a genuine exploration of grief, even if its superhero plot can't quite match its emotional ambitions.

1942 · David Hand · 70 min · Animation, Drama

Bambi is a visually stunning meditation on life, loss, and the cycles of nature that packs more emotional devastation into 70 minutes than most films manage in twice the time.

2012 · Sam Fell · 92 min · Animation

ParaNorman is a spooky, funny, and surprisingly moving stop-motion film that uses its zombie movie exterior to tell a story about tolerance, bullying, and the danger of mob mentality. It's a gateway horror film for kids that treats its young audience with more respect than most live-action horror treats adults.

2004 · Hayao Miyazaki · 119 min · Animation / Fantasy

Howl's Moving Castle is a film that enchants first and explains later, if it explains at all. Miyazaki's animation is breathtaking, Joe Hisaishi's score is among the best in the Ghibli catalog, and Sophie's journey from timid young woman to someone who actually likes herself is worth the price of admission. The plot loses its way in the second half, the war subplot never fully integrates, and first-time viewers will almost certainly leave with questions. These are real flaws, not minor quibbles. But there's a warmth and sincerity to this film that makes its rough edges feel like part of its charm rather than reasons to dismiss it.

2002 · Chris Wedge · 81 min · Animation / Comedy

Ice Age sent a grumpy mammoth, a motormouth sloth, and a conflicted saber-tooth across a freezing world to return a human baby, and built one of animation's most durable franchises on the trip, plus a squirrel. Scrat's acorn obsession became instant slapstick canon, the central trio's bickering warmth still lands, and the finale earns its lump in the throat honestly. The early CG shows its age, the plot is a straight line, and the sequels spent the goodwill down over a decade. Judged as the 2002 original alone, it remains a warm, funny, compact family movie that knew exactly what it was doing.