30 Animated Movies That Are Not for Children

2. Anomalisa (2015)

Anomalisa, Charlie Kaufman’s second directorial effort, co-directed with animator Duke Johnson, has not enjoyed the exposure of his first - Synecdoche, New York - nor his string of early-mid noughties hits as writer, but it’s far and away one of his best.

From the off, Kaufman tacks as close to reality as possible, placing us in the life of middle-aged customer service expert Michael Stone (David Thewlis), who travels to Cincinnati for one night to promote his new book. Everything seems to be proceeding as usual, until Michael meets up with his ex for a drink, and she has a man’s face and the voice of Tom Noonan. But that’s far from the worst of it, because everyone in Michael’s world has this same man’s face and the voice of Tom Noonan - including his own wife and son. However, this all changes when he meets Lisa (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who has her own face and voice, and whom he desperately endeavours to pursue.

A typically Kaufman production, the film manages to carve absurdity out of recognisable reality, and does it with a stop-motion animation style that prioritises realism so as to be as immersive as possible, meaning that when things make a sudden shift into strangeness, we are left reeling. The effect is uncanny, and the delivery of every scene a minor masterwork, leaving us with deep questions about our own perceptions of the people and world around us, and the lives we lead.