Best Animated Feature Film: Ranking Every 96th Academy Award Nominee
Written by Andreas Babiolakis
This article is a part of the Academy Awards Project, where Andreas Babiolakis from Films Fatale ranks every Oscar nominee from worst to best, and goes through every category once a day five days a week.
We’re at the second of the big three feature film categories not called Best Picture (we’ll get to that on Friday, don’t you worry), and it’s time to get through the Best Animated Feature Film nominees! I’ll be honest. This category can be hit or miss, with either a celebration of strong animated features or a shrug of acceptance of whatever a year had to offer in this department. This group of nominees feels like a bit of both scenarios. We have three super-strong releases from all over the world and two good-but-not-spectacular releases that likely wouldn’t have been nominated in more competitive years (having said that, we’ve most certainly had far worse nominees in this category like The Boss Baby). There’s not much more to say about this category, outside of asking the following question: which is the best animated feature film of 2023?
Here are your nominees for Best Animated Feature Film ranked from worst to best.
Biggest Snub: Suzume
Like I said, this wasn’t the strongest year for animated feature films, and Makoto Shinkai’s Suzume isn’t even the director’s best film. Having said that, Suzume is strong enough to have warranted a spot over at least two of the nominated films below, and Shinkai never gets recognized by the Academy Awards (even the Golden Globes honoured this film with a nomination). I’ve said this before and I’m ready to do so again: anime in general is heavily overlooked by the Academy (before you go talking about Hayao Miyazaki, he’s only ever won once for this category. My point stands). Suzume is gorgeously animated and imaginative enough that it could have easily been a part of the final five nominees.
5. Elemental
Let’s get the obvious out of the way: Disney hasn’t had the best year. It didn’t even secure the Best Animated Short Film nominations it was predicted to, including the short film that was projected to win initially (Once Upon a Studio). While I like Elemental more than many (it certainly isn’t Wish bad), it’s still a weaker Pixar-Disney effort that has great execution in some departments (the themes of interracial dating and the clashing of cultures and traditions) but not in all (the plot thread surrounding the political inner-workings stop and start at the film’s convenience, and feel exceptionally shallow in depth). Elemental is still a pretty good film, but not quite “Best Animated Feature Film” material (and certainly not up to the standards of the once-prestigious Pixar studios).
4. Nimona
Nimona is a cute take on some serious subject matters (like political corruption, homophobia, et cetera) that makes these conversations a bit more digestible for younger audiences to watch. It feels a little held back by the film’s propensity to rely on typical tropes and humour, but Nimona is still a fun and meaningful ride for those who are curious to check it out. It’s a harmless film with neat animation and some interesting world-building concepts that take societal allegories to whole new extremes (a futuristic world being stuck in the past is quite fitting). Nimona has its fanbase, and it’s easy to see why given its likability; it’s no masterpiece, but it’s hard to hate this bubbly feature.
3. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Please don’t get angry. Yes, Across the Spider-Verse is mind-melting bliss, with a gripping story and action that is to die for. I think the Spider-Verse films are amongst the best comic book related releases in film history. So, why is this film so low in my ranking? I don’t know… Maybe because it’s half a film? I have the same reservations about Across the Spider-Verse that I do with Dune, where I can only love the film so much because I have yet to know how this story ends. There’s a major difference between parts of a series with cliffhangers (like The Lord of the Rings) and both Dune and Across the Spider-Verse; the former feels like self-sufficient parts of a whole because they were constructed that way, whereas the latter two were previously intended to be one film and were subsequently stretched out to be more (I don’t have this issue with Into the Spider-Verse, for instance). It might seem unfair, but I’m waiting to see the rest of this story play out first before I get definitive about how I feel about it. As it currently stands, Across the Spider-Verse is great. It’s just not done yet, and that is something I don’t readily ignore.
Cameron Geiser’s Review of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
2. Robot Dreams
One of the biggest surprises at this year’s Academy Awards was the nomination of one Robot Dreams: a film that wasn’t on the radar of the general public, and it wound it being the white whale that would prove to be highly challenging to get around to watching for Oscar completionists. Let me tell you: it is so worth it. Robot Dreams is a sensational film that uses next-to-zero dialogue to get its points across, as it blurs the lines between reality, dreams and nightmares, and the passages of time. Using the metaphors of humanity’s best friends of old (a dog) and of new (a self-sufficient robot), Robot Dreams perfectly captures the sensations of both bliss and longing post-separation. Hilarious, devastating, and exquisite, Robot Dreams is not one to miss. Even if you can only get around to it after the Oscars ceremony, do so; Robot Dreams deserves all of the attention it is finally getting.
1. The Boy and the Heron
Sure, it’s nice that Hayao Miyazaki has returned after a ten year retirement, but it’s another thing that The Boy and the Heron is as fantastic as it is (it’s not only the best animated release of 2023, it easily competes with films of all kinds from last year). This surreal take on grief and the coming-of-age genre is equal parts silly and grim as if Miyazaki was inspired by The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time or Majora’s Mask; there’s no better way to represent the steps from youth to adulthood via the chasing of fleeting dreams and the escaping of horrific realities. The Boy and the Heron is top-tier Miyazaki, which is saying a lot regarding his filmography; it feels instantaneous, then, that it would rank at the top of this list of nominees.
Who I Want To Win: I’m rooting for both The Boy and the Heron (the return of the animation medium’s greatest mind with yet another brilliant effort) and Robot Dreams (the little animated film that is defying all odds). I love both enough to want either of them to do well here.
Who I Think Will Win: It seems like the rest of the world doesn’t agree with me in that Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse only feels like half a story with its character arcs, plot development, and more, so it’s currently the frontrunner to win this award. There’s a slim chance that The Boy and the Heron will get this prize instead (while the three other nominees don’t seem to have a chance in hell of winning), but I don’t think Across the Spider-Verse is going to lose at this rate.
The Academy Awards Project will continue tomorrow with another category. We’re going to rank every single nominee in every single category, Monday through Friday. You don’t want to miss it!
Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Ryerson University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.