The Tens: Non-English Animated Films

image courtesy of ifccenter.com

Every year in the Best Animated Feature Oscar category, there are one or two movies from other countries that most American audiences have never seen. Alongside the Pixars, Disneys, and Aardmans (not American, but still English-language), you'll see a Ghibli (Japan), a Cartoon Saloon (Ireland), or a Folimage (France). Every so often, one of these foreign-language films takes the prize:

• 2002: Spirited Away (Ghibli) — pictured above

• 2023: The Boy and the Heron (Ghibli)

• 2024: Flow (Dream Well, Sacrebleu, Take Five)

We're also seeing more Laika films crack the top five in recent years, though many animated films are actually co-productions between multiple countries. The three production companies behind Flow, for example, are Latvian, French, and Belgian. But I digress.

Animated films give filmmakers a unique opportunity to do something original - often at a lower cost than live action. This results in plenty of sequels and lazy trash, sure, but it also produces some truly engaging and innovative work that moves well beyond what general audiences are used to seeing at the theater. Studio Ghibli (I've already seen all of their films, so they won't be included in this Ten) is the gold standard here, especially Hayao Miyazaki's filmography, where an imaginative sense of whimsy is paired with deep, sometimes adult themes - all delivered in animation not too dissimilar from the hand-drawn Disney films of their classic era.

Oscars aside, animation has always been a refuge for filmmakers who think outside the box. Long before there was an Oscar for Best Animated Feature, there was already a powerful international presence in animation. The landmarks that predate the award span the globe:

• France: Fantastic Planet (1973), Gandahar (1987), The King and the Mockingbird (1980)

• Japan: Akira (1988), all of Studio Ghibli's output, including non-Miyazaki films like Grave of the Fireflies (1988) and Perfect Blue (1997)

• Germany: The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

There's plenty more, but I won't just hand you a list of bullet points. It's not that the Oscar itself increased the output - it's that the award emerged parallel to the expansion of the Internet, which widened access to these films. That's why most "Greatest Foreign-Language Animated Films" lists tend to skew heavily post-2001.

All this is to say: in a world of minions, spider-men, and anthropomorphic toys, some of the greatest animated films come from well outside American borders. It would be easy to make this list all French or all Japanese (maybe that's a future Tens), but my final list spans seven different countries. Five of the films predate the Best Animated Feature Oscar, including the earliest surviving animated feature, The Adventures of Prince Achmed.

So, for the maiden voyage of The Tens, here is my list of yet unseen films, sorted chronologically by release date. Watch along, make suggestions, and share your thoughts. Be nice.

• The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926) — Germany

• Bubble Bath (1980) — Hungary

• Son of the White Mare (1981) — Hungary

• Angel's Egg (1985) — Japan

• The Pied Piper (1986) - Czechoslovakia

• Millennium Actress (2001) — Japan

• Persepolis (2007) — France

• Have a Nice Day (2017) - China

• The Wolf House (2018) - Chile

• Belle (2021) — Japan