Arts: The Best Animated Film of the Year

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Brow Beat The Best Animated Film of the Year By Forrest Wickman Posted Monday, Dec 10, 2012, at 05:40 PM ET Last week the National Board of Review chose the fun but forgettable Wreck-It Ralph as the year's best animated film, and the New York Film Critics Circle Awards chose Tim Burton's gorgeously rendered Frankenweenie. Over the weekend, Boston and Los Angeles also went for Frankenweenie, and between now and Oscar time, we may see some love for Studio Ghibli's The Secret World of Arrietty, Laika's ParaNorman, and Brave, the latest but not greatest from Pixar. But the best animated film of the year is about a stick figure named Bill. Bill is the star of It's Such a Beautiful Day, the latest from independent animator Don Hertzfeldt. Hertzfeldt is known for making sick, hilarious shorts films about endless dental procedures and balloons that turn on toddlers. As those descriptions suggest, his earlier shorts, which might be described as Looney Tunes directed by Franz Kafka, aren't for everyone. Ironically, this was more or less the point of his 2000 short Rejected, and yet it still won over enough members of the Academy to get nominated for an Oscar. But from the opening moments of It's Such a Beautiful Day, which is a feature Hertzfeldt completed in the three parts over the course of five years, it's clear that Hertzfeldt is after something different. The movie's first image is not animated but live-action, and the opening notes of the soundtrack are the opening harp strings and flutes of The Moldau, a symphonic poem ... To continue reading, click here. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES Also In Slate Where Is the Red Line on Assad's Chemical Weapons? CPI Unchained The Season of Renewal and Suicide	Advertisement
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