I wish the world of cinema would have the same attitude to film aspect ratios. It seems that every film made nowadays has to be in 'scope. There's nothing wrong with 'scope of course, but some beautiful films have been made in 1.85:1 and 1.37:1. I feel it's to the detriment of the film industry that other aspect ratios are forgotten - hopefully this is just a trend.



Steve W

That's great Dr. K!



But you are hardly breaking new ground here. Your views do feel dated as there is so much of hand drawn 2D with CGI 3D happening in movies right now that drawing distinctions between each is ultimately pointless.



You must be aware that the recent fad of rotoscope animation techniques (Through A Scanner Darkly etc) was used by Disney as early as Snow White!



What we will see is just more animation (perhaps in 3D where desired) that is the result of 2D and CGI 3D coming together to try and tell you a good interesting story in sound and picture.



Once again we should make the distinction that CGI/VFX is NOT a genre but a medium by which filmmakers tell stories. If a movie is bad blame the filmmakers and NOT the computer program!

My problem is that there are not only far too many digitally animated movies out there, the majority of them being bland, middle-of-the-road fillers, they represent the Keane (annoyingly po-faced "indie" band which appeal to your friends that don't actually like music...a less wealthy Coldplay if you will) of the film industry.



And you know what, I include "Up" in this lot!



Like Romantic Comedies, they seem to clog up multiplexes more than any other genre. Give me generic horror films any day of the week!

I do find it frustrating that even now animated films carry the stigma of being viewed as a genre aimed exclusively at children, rather than being a medium capable of expressing any genre of film. You only need to look back no further than the fantastic Waltz with Bashir and Persepolis to see this.



Just on Ponyo, I've seen the subtitled Japanese version and don't think I could bring myself to watch the dubbed version. Miss Cyrus just sounds whiny, spoiled and irritating as Ponyo. I wonder if even animated films offer a different experience when watching in a foreign language.

Well said Mark! Animation is one of the most transcendent forms of cinema and should be given more respect from the film industry. Could I also point out the genius of John Lasseter, who brought Miyazaki's work to a western audience, produced the comeback of hand drawn animation and had control over many of the Pixar masterpieces.

It's a shame Ponyo appears to only be showing in its dubbed version at cinemas. I don't think I can stand to sit through the dub, I'll have to wait for the DVD to see the subtitled version.

Well I can't speak for the quality of Ponyo, but I've usually enjoy Ghibli's dubbing in the past. As far as I'm concerned Billy Bob Thornton as Jigo in Princess Mononoke is brilliant and a lot of my love for that film comes from the voice talents used.



Same goes for Michael Keaton in Porco Rosso and Willem Defoe in Tales of Earthsea (and I wasn't even that big of a fan of Earthsea). Ghibli do well in their casting for the dubbed version if you ask me and I'm willing to give Ponyo a go in that format.

Er, dubbed format versus non-dubbed format?!



They are both dubbed, people!



Are you telling me a Japanese deaf person could lip read from the original? From the clip I just saw, I think not.

You are looking a bit peaky, Mark

You mean he's looking a little drawn?

I think he may have been watching 'Twilight' too often. By the end he is glowing like he was drinking the milk out of Mel Gibson's fridge.

The 3D porn business should do well when 3D home players are ubiquitous. By the way, what happened to your first version of this vid-blog – before you edited out the naughty bits and put in the bong sound instead eh? ;-) When Dr M mentions pointy things (spears, arrows, swords and the like) in 3D movies gratuitously hovering over audiences’ heads, I shudder to think what additional items may make his list if this new genre takes flight.



Also, hoping for the day when we non-UK’ers can watch the BBC 5 studio cams (Drs M and K circus) again. Can’t someone put all of these on Youtube or let me pay the BBC fee to watch (think of the extra revenue we could generate and lower UK license fees as a result – export income!).

Dr K, I was wondering if you had any idea as to why Avatar is nominated for (and will most likely win) best picture, but isn't even nominated for best animated feature?



Is it because to many people "animated feature" implies a film that is for children? That might explain why A Scanner Darkly wasn't nominated either.

@ antimode



it's true that a lip reader probably couldn't tell what a cartoon is saying, but the film has still been animated to sync up with japanese, and not english.

Here! Here! Dr K.

I saw this blog appear briefly on the site almost a week ago. Then it got taken down. Now it's back up again. What's the deal here?

14. It is interesting how blurred the line is getting between live action and digital animation. The same could be said of the big battle scenes in LOTR and many of the big set pieces in superhero movies and the like.

Saw Ponyo this morning with my six year old and he loved it. We were in a tiny screen in the Empire in Newcastle- about 100 seats max. He loved it as did I. I let him watch Spirited Away at the weekend and he did so, twice!

I have seen the subtitled version of Ponyo and have to say that as far as animated films go- the voice cast do a professional enough job to not have to watch it in its native tongue.



Oh and Mark- I laughed when you tried to defend your like of Where The Wild Things Are as it is 'CLEARLY' aimed at the same market as the Mr Fox you hated so much.



I loved both by the way.

@tommus-jay



I thought that was what dubbing is all about. You try try to sync up dialogue with the picture and in the course of doing this you may need to modify the actual dialogue that is used. If you watch a foreign DVD that has both English subtitles and an English soundtrack, they will not match because the subtitle is a more or less direct translation whereas the the soundtrack dialogue has been modified to fit the motion of the actor's mouth. For an animated film dubbing in the original language is probably not going to be that close a fit anyway. You only have to look at something like South Park or more anciently Marine Boy or those "Charley Says" Public Information films to see that a lot of effort has not been spent to do this in the original language. From the clip that was shown it is quite noticeable how often the filmaker has avoided having to sync dialogue in the original language by having the character that is speaking either not in frame, or facing in another direction. I don't think it is worth being anally retentive over whether a cartoon is dubbed over the original dubbing.

Oops! Marine Boy was actually from Japan. I do think dubbing technology has improved since the 60's, though.

Great to see the Academy not forgetting about good old Wallace and Gromit in the short film category, even after all this time. Not sure they'll win though, but wouldn't it but great for Nick Park and Aardman (and for the UK, I suppose) to grab a fourth statue. They really have become masters of the old fashioned rousing adventure film, with a healthy dose of uniquely British irreverence thrown in for good measure.

Dear Doc,

a personal plea - stop using that grisly portmanteau word 'digimation'. Animation as a word (literally the action of imparting life,vitality and motion) covers any and all methods used to make it perfectly well. Animators can utilise paint, pen, film, plasticine or pixel to get the results they want - very different tools perhaps, but the skill to 'impart life' is not one dependent on any particular technology, I'm sure you'll agree. Let digimation die quietly in the outer darkness.



Oh and p.s. - your perceived annoyance at new technology would make you a Luddite, not a Philistine. Not understanding the difference between the two, however, would make you a philistine, so technically you're both.

The dubbing is fine in this, apart from an unintentionally funny bit when some waves make a weird noise and Liam Neeson translates it in a 'Lassie' fashion.



The 'Ponyo, Ponyo, Ponyo' song at the end had a little girl up and dancing in front of the screen. Genius.

I'm a 15 year old from Vancouver, Canada.

I grew up with such hand drawn films as Spirited Away, Fantasia, Thumbalina and Ferngully. As mcuh success as digital or any other format might earn, I am always captivated by the storytelling and art of a hand drawn. And yes, Dr. K, kids do so enjoy the dark.

I know Ponyo is going to be awesome, but I can't stand the screechy American dub they've got. I can understand why they do it (for the kids), but it's a Japanese film, a Japanese animation, and it sounds weird having American voices yammering all over it.



Also, "She wasn't like any other fish..." Uuuuuuungh. (That's the sound of my brain being hammered to death with a god-awful cliche.)

I'm sure that the many younger viewers will prefer the dubbed version, rather than having to read subtitles, or worse, have their parents read the subtitles to them...

I teach languages, and I ALWAYS put the subtitles on. It has amazed me how even those kids who are lower ability, or who have really low reading ages, settle down, get carried away with the story and the images and listen to the language. Its great. Don't listen to anyone who says "I can't read the subtitles", total nonsense. Give them time to settle down and get into the story.



Successful films (animations) so far are:



Spirited Away in Japanese

Kirikou and the Sorciere in French

Shrek in English (to French kids)



not to mention heaps of other non-English speaking films.



As for the animation argument, I don't really care how the animation is done, as long as it doesn't detract from the story. Sometimes I think the technique gets in the way of the storytelling (3D?). I'm not a big fan of mixing the techniques: the waltz in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, or the bit in Spirited Away when Haku takes Sen/Chihiro to the farm and they're going through the rhododendrons. It doesn't add anything in my view.



LOVE animation, I wish there was more, especially for adults.

I agree totally with Mark's conclusion about: "the variety - stop motion animation, hand drawn animation, digital animation, 2D and 3D animation - all co-existing and thriving together; animation shows us the internationalism, the diversity, the artistic capability that film has."



Perhaps it's because animation attracts those that would be graphic artists in any medium; inevitably they'll have different styles, influences and sensibilities that are reflected in their work. Perhaps the longer lead in time animation requires also means more care is lavished on script, character and scene design?



Looking at various good examples of animation, say, Wallace and Gromit, Lion King, Wall-E, Nightmare Before Christmas, Kung Fu Panda (underrated btw), Waltz with Bashir, UP, Spirited Away, Finding Nemo, Tokyo Godfathers, A Scanner Darkly, Belleville Rendez-Vous, 9, Ratatouille, Jungle Book, The Incredibles, Princess Mononoke, Persepolis, Coraline, Fear(s) of the Dark, Millennium Actress or any of the many (great) animated short films or TV series such as The Simpsons or South Park (or even the Muppets) and trying to say this animation style or technique is better than the others is a mug's game.



As with any film it is story and character that are most important. We may have a particular liking for one visual style or technique over another, but all are equally capable of producing visually stunning scenes, of engaging emotions and telling a good story.



Also agree totally with comment 4. "I do find it frustrating that even now animated films carry the stigma of being viewed as a genre aimed exclusively at children..."



If it is a good film it is a good film regardless of the audience its made for or technique employed.

I've enjoyed a whole range of animated films (and admired their artistry) in recent years be they Wall-E or Kung Fu Panda or the more adult themed Persepolis, Fear(s) of the Dark or Waltz with Bashir.

Mark may be considered grumpy, but I just think he's passionate. I'm not convinced by 3D either - it looks like a floating hologram in front of me, kind of like my old dinosaur holographic rulers in the 90s but on a bigger scale ;)



I think what happened in terms of CGI animation taking over is that studios saw success by Pixar with their CGI animated films and thought the reason they were successful was cause it was CGI animation.



By the turn of the last decade, CGI animation had become ubiquitous for most mainstream animated films from Hollywood and storytelling declined, as studios reckoned that CGI would ostensibly be enough to be a license to print money.



This band wagon jumping became saddening, as 2D was seen as obsolete and pushed in the corner like an old, forgotten toy no one wanted to play with anymore. Unloved and superfluous.



Concerning the Oscar noms for animated films, enjoyed Up - thought the first ten mins of the scenes with Married Life score by Giacchino were fantastic (before it went all squeaky taking dogs cliche).

Though Princess and the Frog was massively disappointing and I grew up watching Thumbelina (brought it on DVD years ago) and other Bluth films (An American Tail and The Land Before Time) and I think, after re-watching now older, that Thumbelina's one of Bluth's worst films. It turns a brave, resourceful heroine from Andersen's tale into a whinging annoyance. Cornelius and her flirting earlier in the film was the only high point, and the Let Me Be Your Wings song(and its variation the song called Sun). Jaquimo is so annoying! Always singing 'Follow you heart!', in a faux French accent - shut up! I think Bluth's magnum opus was The Secret of NIMH.



Coraline was a much better stop-mo animated film than the incongruous quirkiness of Fantastic Mr Fox. What about The Secret of Kells? That's 2D that has a lovely aesthetic as well.



I've seen Ponyo with English subtitles and I much prefer it like that. It's cutely animated, sweet-natured, thrilling in parts, lovely score and with likable characters. It's nice to see different types of animation and not only one taking superiority over the others - after all, to use the hackneyed term: variety is the spice of life.

I'm not a fan of the Best Animated Feature category, for a couple of reasons. For one, it might as well be known as the 'best kid's film of the year' award, because as other people have said this is the arena it generally covers.



I also think it's odd to have an animation award, and not, say...a best digital film award to oppose a best celluloid award. I realise it's not QUITE the same, but I make the point to stress - as people seem to ignore often - that animation isn't a genre, it's a format. If Wall-E and Waltz With Bashir showed in 2008, the animation base can be used for wonderfully dissimilar filmmaking, for wildly differing reasons. Wall-E is a family adventure which uses the animation to create an entirely fantastical future-world and bring life to the characters inhabiting them. Waltz With Bashir uses animation to make all of life a dreamlike memory, allowing the film to dance on the edge between memory and reality and question the lines between them. It also shows us that envelope-pushing advances in CGI - facial/behavioral nuances aren't everything, and that making something more 'realistic' if you will, isn't the important thing, just that we recognise something 'real' in and of the context of the film.



That was rambling and probably made little sense.



In other news, I think it's a real shame that Up'll win the Best Animated Feature Oscar, partly because I was so underwhelmed by it and am baffled by the level of praise it is courting...and mostly because Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - my favourite family film for a long while, and one of my favourites of last year - didn't even get a nomination.



And while I'm here, I want t'recommend Mark see "Rejected" by Don Hertzfeldt if he hasn't (it's available on Youtube, among other places) - a really anarchic, surreal and slightly terrifying short from what looks like an untrustworthy animator. And one who really understands the power of sound design, particularly concerning the climax of the film. Enjoy.

And it's speckled with typos..but nevermind.

It's late at night and an irrelevant thought wandered across my mind. All film-making is animation, they're just taking the individual frames really quickly rather than one by one.



OK, as you were.

... and the illusion of motion created by 24 fps is well worth the admission price for any film. Ahem.



I don't think I'm a dubbing snob, having enjoyed Ghibli's output in either incarnation. But, having heard a clip from Ponyo, I decided to see the subtitled version, rather than have Liam Neeson's fine voice distracting me from the film. I am lucky enough that our local arts house offers screenings of both versions.



Of course I enjoyed the marvellous, gentle, wonderful Ponyo. I probably would have enjoyed the dubbed version, I've found previous dubbed Ghibli's to be class acts. But here's the very slight edge that the original has:



1. More naturalistic: The five year olds sound more like 5 year olds, the dub (which I've caught from the trailer), not so much the child actors are about 10 year olds. Also, and I've found this on the other dubs, the voices sound louder, whether that's the sound mix or difference between japanese and american english inflection, it just makes the voices that little bit on top of the rest of the sounds (in the dub) rather than within the world (in the original).



2. Not distracted by "star turn" voices. I have nothing against the well cast and well delivered dubs, but often the recognizable voice of a star calls to mind the person, sorry, it's how the brain works, not anyone's fault. This applies to English language animation as well, one of the things I enjoyed along with its more obvious charms about Cloudy with A Chance of Meatballs, was that the audience was sitting there waiting for the next vocal cameo (Shrek comes to mind).



3. Some dubs overact slightly -- this is hard to describe, but I'll have a go, this again may be a problem with direction of dubbing, or the sound mix, but dubbing actor's often sound as if they're doing radio or theatrical "mask" work, where we are supposed to get all the emotion from their voice, which leaves less room for the animators (who can achieve as great range of emotion with no dialogue).



These are vague and abstract differences, but they are different for better or worse or just as good...

Oops, sorry. My comment above about Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs should have read: that the audience wasn't sitting there waiting for the next vocal cameo.

Sorry again.

You're totally wrong about Fantastic Mr Fox. It's a work of genius. And I don't think it's actually aimed at kids. I think most of the humour is for adults. But I don't think thats a failure on Wes Anderson's part. I think it was very, very intentional.



Anderson wasn't trying to tap into the kids market to make some extra money. He was putting his own unique style into adapting a childrens book, but wasn't making it for children. Is there anything wrong with that? The dialogue is not "all over the place", it has a very consistent tone and mood which is maintained throughout. You're massively wrong. And Skiffle music is rubbish.

@Peter Davies



"...And Skiffle music is rubbish."



Aaaaand you lost him.

On the subject of Ponyo, it's omission from the best animated film genre has to be the biggest Oscar snub of the year. Easily the best animation of last year, and that's coming from somebody who absolutely loved Up and Princess and the Frog.



I hope to god Miyazaki doesn't stop making films any time soon. He's the best thing that's ever happened to animation in my opinion, and he still provides something for the genre that nobody else can. I love Pixar, as well as plenty of independent animated films, but none of them come close to Ghibli.

I am rather tired of people referring to films like "Spirited Away" and "The Princess and the Frog" as being done in the "old fashion" way. "The Princess and the Frog" was actually made using Disney's second (!) generation of animation software.



Films like "Snow White" were made by tracing drawings onto cels, and then painting, then filming the cels. That's the old fashion way, and neither Disney, Studio Ghibli, nor most other animation studios use that method anymore. They scan their drawings into a computer, and then do all the rest of the work digitally.



In Japanese animation, they will sometimes use both regular 2D characters with "Toy Story" type 3D animation. They usually hide the 3D by using "cel-shading" to make everything blend into the 2D world. Both "Spirited Away" and "Howl's Moving Castle" used the technique, and you can also see it in American animation, such as in "The Iron Giant". Or rather, not see it, as it was done so well.

While enjoying the rants the reviews I like best are those for non-blockbusters that I wouldn't otherwise have even considered; my DVD collection would be poorer without your recommendation of films such as Pan's Labyrinth, Hard Candy and Offside to name just three.



I look forward to seeing Ponyo as I've yet to see a Studio Ghibli film that I didn't enjoy. It is good that there is a variety of animation styles being made today and that not all animation is being aimed at children.

It always annoys me that Steamboy was so ignored in this country - it's set in Manchester! Lovingly detailed British Victorian industrial townscapes! And steam-powered mecha, what more do you want? Although the international version had lots of the Manchester scenes cut out, apparently, so we don't even get to see as much of our own country...



Much as I appreciate Miyazaki's artistry, it is frustrating that the only Japanese animation that currently makes it to full release in UK cinemas, is Ghibli films.