Luc Haasbroek is a writer and videographer from Durban, South Africa. He has written articles for sites like Paste and Briefly.
Animation is generally associated with kids' entertainment; all sunny plots and cute characters. However, the subgenre of animated thrillers is a rich one, jam-packed with classics. These films tend to be visually daring, bending reality and diving into surreal, complex worlds that would be challenging to realize in live-action. With this in mind, this list covers ten of the best animated thrillers, each notable for its unique approach to suspense.
Rooted in Czech folklore, Little Otik blends dark humor with horror, creating a suspenseful, surreal tale about obsession and denial. It's essentially a cinematic dark fairy tale. Although the movie is slightly overlong at 132 minutes, it boasts more than enough sharp ideas and eerie imagery to warrant a viewing. It's certainly creative, drawing on classic opera and weaving in grim social commentary, resulting in a bleak statement on 21st-century life in the Czech Republic.
✕ Remove Ads Mars Express is essentially animated noir with a hefty of of speculative science, but it grounds every scene in drama and layered characterization. The movie serves up a bevy of big ideas in a striking package of hand-drawn animation. Indeed, it crams an impressive amount into its lean 89-minute runtime. The pace never lets up. So many concepts are explored, including rogue AI, hacking, machine personhood, and robots' rights.
✕ Remove Ads Martin Rosen's adaptation of Richard Adams's novel combines minimalist animation with a dark, atmospheric tone that heightens the tension in each encounter. Watership Down certainly doesn't shy away from the harsh realities of survival, delivering an intense and often unsettling story of resilience and bravery.
✕ Remove Ads Paprika is a vivid, creative movie in the vein of Ghost in the Shell and The Matrix, using a killer sci-fi concept to craft a thrilling, intelligent story. The visuals range from ecstatic to unsettling, with reality-based scenes rendered in a subtle, grounded style that contrasts beautifully with the wilder dream sequences. It's a story that could likely only be told in anime.
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