Readers' Choice Poll Archive

[James]

Readers' Choice Best of 2012 Poll

Every year we tell you what the Academy, Hollywood guilds, and the critics chose as the best animated film of the year. We even tell you what we think. But now it's your turn!

Vote in our first Readers' Choice poll for the best animated film of 2012. The 21 Oscar eligible movies are listed on the page below. Just click the posters of your first, second, and third choices and then hit the submit button at the bottom of the page. We'll tally up all the numbers and reveal our readers' choice in late January.

http://animatedviews.com/contest/best2012/

Feel free to share your top three in this thread!

[laughingoctopus]

1. Paranorman
2. The Pirates
3. Frankenweenie

[James]

The poll is done and you can read about it and all our other picks for the best of 2012 here:
http://animatedviews.com/2013/the-best- ... lypse-not/

Here was the final full countdown of results for the reader poll:

1. Wreck-It Ralph
2. Brave
3. ParaNorman
4. Frankenweenie
5. Rise of the Guardians
6. The Pirates! Band of Misfits
7. Madagascar 3
8. Hotel Transylvania
9. From Up on Poppy Hill
10. Dr. Seuss' The Lorax
11. The Rabbi's Cat
12. Ice Age Continental Drift
13. Zarafa
14. The Painting
15. Secret of the Wings
16. Adventures in Zambezia
17. Delhi Safari
18. The Mystical Laws
19. A Liar's Autobiography
20. Walter & Tandoori's Christmas
21. Hey Krishna

[Ben]

Hey! Adventures in Zambezia charted!

[James]

The Academy, Hollywood guilds, critics, and even the Animated Views staff will be rendering their judgment on the top films of the year. But now it's your turn to make a selection. What was the best animated film of 2013?

Tell us here: http://animatedviews.com/contest/best2013/

[Dacey]

#1 Frozen
#2 The Croods
#3 Monsters University

Although I haven't seen Turbo yet, but have heard good things.

[Randall]

Turbo was widely panned, due to a derivative and ridiculous storyline. (It's also a whole lot like Planes.) On the other hand, I kinda liked it.

[James]

Just realized Escape From Planet Earth was left off the Oscar eligible list I used for this poll! Sorry about that guys, I should have caught that. Wonder why it didn't make the Oscar list?

[Dacey]

I had no idea at first, but then I remembered, wasn't that movie from The Weinstein Company? And sure enough, it was. There are serious egomaniacs over there at The Weinstein Company, and they probably didn't want to risk the "embarrassment" of the film actually being nominated, or jokes at their expense for submitting the movie in the first place.

That's all speculation, of course, but they are notorious for "tailor-making" what people consider to be "Oscar" films...a category Planet Earth just wouldn't fall into in their eyes. Heck, they're already in trouble for their intentionally misleading "Winner" ads that they've been running for the Golden Globes, and while that's not "related" to Planet Earth at all, it does say something about the way that they play. And I'm not saying anything positive or negative about the actual quality of the films they make, but they do have their "reputation" regarding this sort of thing.

Am I turning into Eric?

[Ben]

I've stated my dismay at this year's crop elsewhere, but to pick up on Rand's comment - and as much as I knocked the film early on for basically being a Ratatouille knock off - every time I look in my box of recent animated BDs to catch up on, Turbo keeps looking like the one that just might be the most fun!

[Randall]

Turbo IS fun. My little guy laughed all the way through. Ignore how ridiculous it is--- and how it blatantly mixes Ratatouille and Cars--- and just go with it.

BTW, I saw Frozen 3D yesterday, and really liked it. (Though the Mickey short gave the BEST reason to see it in 3D.) I loved how Frozen seemed like just another princess story, but did do a few things differently, including a keen twist on the "love story" aspect. (Twist, and twist again!) Great job.

[Ben]

I've had the soundtrack for a couple of weeks now and can't get Do You Want To Build A Snowman (shouldn't that be Make A Snowman?) out of my head (I've been driving Jenny crazy bursting into it every five minutes). For The First Time In Forever is okay, though she sounds like Jodi Benson and I can't get Ariel out of my head, while Let It Go is really the only song that *doesn't* sound like Alan Menken had something to do with it (I know he didn't, natch).

Although they're catchy and I've been singing away to them all day while insulating our basement, I'm not sure how I stand on them: Snowman is such a good opener (well, after the Pocahontas-like chorus setter) that the others don't quite stand up to the same level. There's a strong Europop influence in there (Let It Go could be straight from the Simon Cowell factory, for instance, and it won't be long before it's being sung by American Idol and X-Factor wannabes), but apart from the big power ballads I'm not sure the rest of the songs are all that.

The Menken influence is present (it's like they listened to all the classic Menken stuff and were told "come up with more of that but different"), but even the fixer-upper song isn't something that matches anything that's come before. You can hear the inevitable stage show almost being written as the songs play on the soundtrack, but I can't wait to actually see how they work in the movie with all the visuals, especially Let It Go, whose vocal histrionics I still find very shrill on the CD and which I'm hoping is mixed into the rest of the soundtrack more (I think they would have got *more* emotion here if she'd pulled back as in the earlier verses rather than shout everything out).

Frozen is when an animated Disney musical becomes an pop-orientated soundtrack going for the High School Musical kids. I'm not saying I'm against that: I actually think the first HSM has some really good songs in it, but there's a definite shift in going from traditional musical numbers to the kinds of big Broadway rock ballads that "the kids" seem to like nowadays. Although I'm not always a fan of the singing or all of the songs from the score, I'll let you know what I think of the movie after I eventually see it next Tuesday evening (first chance we'll have)...!

I'm debating the 3D: I am still awed by Tangled in that format but was hoping to skip this one. The timings will decide it - whichever version is playing in the Tuesday evening slot will be the one we watch. I'm much more excited for the Mickey short, but I can always catch up with that in 3D on the BD when it comes along (wonder if they'll do the Christmas/winter thing and hold this back until next fall or if they'll do a late spring/summer release, for which Olaf will inevitably be pressed into action to make a lame snowman/summer connection theme!).

[Randall]

Frozen pre-orders are up already, but no date yet. And the 3D version will come later, as Wal-Mart reportedly will have an exclusive on that for a while.

I liked the songs overall, though they were a little uneven. The power ballads didn't always fit, and I didn't think the queen's singing voice was right (though very good)--- was it really the same actress doing the singing? She sounded... too New York, maybe? (The actress is a New Yorker.) But none of the songs embarrassed, and they were all at least good, with a couple real winners.

[Ben]

Yep...got the regular version on my wish list as a reminder.

Big fan of Idina Menzel and her stuff in Wicked. As a Broadway big hitter thesedays it is her vocal all through Frozen, though she does have the Noo Yawk accent (and, I think, sounds too shrill here as opposed to hitting the high notes in Wicked). And with her in a role, I never got why she didn't get a song in Enchanted!

[Randall]

Ah, she's from Wicked. Gotcha. yes, i suppose she'd be alowed to do her own singing then.

She's really great, but a rasp comes out in her voice when she sings big, which didn't seem to suit the ice queen as well.