CGI gets a bad rap around these parts of the interweb.

If it doesn’t involve giant blue cats dry humping each other in the middle of a glowing forest, then it’s some amphibian floppy eared twat running around ruining your favourite sci-fi saga.

Many forget that CGI animation is also responsible for some of the best movies to have graced the screen, managing to reduce grown men to blubbering wrecks at the site of a robot falling in love with a flying iPad.

So we’ve cobbled together our Top 10 CGI Films, all in aid to celebrate the release of The Battle For Terra on DVD from July 5. Read our list after the jump…

Honorable Mention: Battle For Terra (2010)

When the poor bobble-headed inhabitants of Terra (Terrians) have their peaceful existence rudely interrupted by a general with a rather enormous stick up his arse, they find themselves having to battle for their planet.

It may look like a cheap Avatar but it actually holds a decent amount of action and a voice cast that includes Chris Evans (not the ginger one), Brian Cox (not the scientist one) and Justin Long (…).

10. Beowulf (2007)

Ever wondered what Ray Winstone would look like with a six-pack and a mean predilection for fighting a ‘Mohnnstarr’? Us neither. Ever wondered what a naked Angelina Jolie would look like with no nipples and a cat’s tail? Us too! A great action film from Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis, taking the old Anglo-Saxon epic and making it cool for the yuff of today, innit.

9. Ratatouille (2007)

Breaking every health and safety rule known to man, this tale of an aspiring rat chef and filling it with a sewer’s worth of humour and spectacle. It’s also serviceable to Pixar that they managed to make those food-shaped polygons that Remy the Rat creates so fiendishly appetising. It’s amazing that the film ever saw the light of day at all, given that the original director left the project far into production. It would’ve taken longer for replacement director, Brad Bird, to make beans on toast than the amount of time he had left to rewrite and direct this sublime slice of cinema.

8. Monsters Inc. (2001)

If you ever thought the scariest monster that John Goodman encountered was Roseanne Barr on a weekly basis, then… well, you’d be right. But as Sully, the blue-furred monster in Monsters Inc., a child is just about the scariest thing he ever encountered. Now if that isn’t a metaphor for growing-up and becoming a parent then we don’t know what one is. Luckily, it’s also colourful enough to keep everyone entertained throughout, and that climatic door chase is just inspired.

7. Ice Age (2002)

Ice Age is quite a crude CGI ‘toon, not in tone but just in style. Yet, this Three Men and a Baby rip-off was just what those kiddies wanted back in 2002 and has fast become one of those franchises that seems to print money. Manny, Sid and Diego have become quite a fierce threesome, managing to survive the Ice Age, the melting ice caps and 3D. This franchise is far from extinct.

6. Finding Nemo (2003)

Ellen DeGeneres has managed to annoy generations of television viewers, so it was new territory when she set her sights on cinema and your unknowing offspring. Yet, somehow, the fishy fish Dory was just about one of the funniest CGI creations to ever hit the screen. It was also the most visually gorgeous animated efforts ever. If ocean creatures were really that bright and colorful then we’d all be down there. Instead it’s full of discarded crisp packets and unwanted cats.

5. Shrek 1 & 2 (2001)

When we were first told that Wayne Rooney was going to play the lead in a new hit film from Dreamworks then we couldn’t believe. Then followed the announcement that Sarah Jessica Parker would be playing his comedy sidekick and we found ourselves assuming the worst. Somehow Shrek became an international hit, spawning three sequels and making Parker and Rooney household names again. Parker has since had a baby with Sporty Spice and Rooney went on to ruin the hopes and dreams of everyone in the history of the world, ever.

4. Wall-E (2008)

If Apple made romantic comedies… then it probably wouldn’t look like this. That’s because Wall-E has a point, telling a story of isolation and finding love in the most unexpected places. It also has a message about the environment or some bullshit like that (boooo!). Who couldn’t help but get all misty-eyed with Johnny 5-wannabe Wall-E gets a battering before the end?  It’s emotional porn wrapped in children’s entertainment, dammit!

3. Toy Story 1 &2 (1995)

The first foray into CGI animation, delivering a story of a secret world of toys, just doing their daily grind at the office – which, just happens to be a toybox – as they serve their omnipotent overlord, all in the hopeless pursuit of acceptance. Toy Story was deep stuff. The sequel improved on that: exploring feelings of rejection, growing old and legacy. This isn’t just a a fairytale, it was a story for adults. It also has Tim Allen in it; isn’t The Santa Clause great? It’s got Judge Reinhold in it and everything.

2. Up (2009)

The most depressing five minutes to ever grace the silver screen and it’s in a kid’s movie. Yet, the rest of the movie is a colourful adventure, taking a geriatric grump on a globe-trotting adventure with a talking dog, Emu and a fat Asian kid. This list has fast become our favourite Pixar movies but Up isn’t just one of the best animated movies of the last decade but flat out one of the best films. Frankly, anything with a talking dog in it gets our vote. That’s why Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco is our bestest movie ever!

1. The Incredibles (2004)

A superhero movie at number 1, hecklerspray? How grimly predictable. If it doesn’t have spandex, explosions or made before 1990 then you don’t care, do you? Actually, it’s a rather brilliant movie. Following The Iron Giant, Brad Bird followed-up that animated masterstroke with a superior story of the power of family. Or is that a family of powers?

The reason it gets the top spot? Because it’s the only animated movie on the list that we’d love to see a live action version of. It probably wouldn’t be a spot on the original but seeing Frozone, Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl and co. strut their stuff again would be, well, super.

Agree? Disagree? You know what to do, sound off below.

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Good, bad.

Folded:

• Beowulf on Blu-Ray DVD (probably looks even better on a decent 40” plasma. Send us one please)

• The Satorialist (while none of us will ever look this cool, we can at least laugh at the ones that don’t quite pull it off…)

• Lynx Dark Temptation (this looks interesting, smell like sugary food and all the ladies will love you)

• The Sopranos…again (it was all a dream we have decided)

• The Huffington Post (two minutes perusing the media section and you can see why this is No.1. Still not as funny as us though)

Creased:

• 10,000 B.C. (easy top five in The Worst Films Ever Made)

• Zavvi (what, where’s Virgin?! Where the heck did this place spring from?)

• Skins series 2 (just the same as Skins series 1. ‘Nuff said, squares – as the kids probably say)

• Lynx Dark Temptation (Lynx Cider & Black is on the cards for next year apparently, because the ladies love that too. Or they did in about 1995 anyway).

• Easter (chocolate in egg form hardly justifies a special edition TV guide)

December 27. A day even more boring than Boxing Day. The turkey's more rubbery, the decorations are more tatty and you've eaten so much Haribo you've started to hallucinate.

But fear not, because hecklerspray's very own personal best-of-2007 lists are here again to save the day. Literally save the day. Like Superman would. As you know by now, the Spraylist is a chance to shine a light on the essentially contradictory nature of the senior hecklerspray writers by getting them to reveal a bunch of stuff they liked this year, even though chances are all the stuff's been slagged off on these pages within the last 12 months anyway. Probably by the same people who are now saying they liked it. It's a tough life.

Today – our favourite movies of 2007…

Stuart Heritage

In a year when Hollywood seemed to be hell-bent on making issue-bloated movies about the war, along came Michael Clayton – a sombre, autumnal, intelligent thriller that actually managed to be thrilling – and blew everything else away. Compelling performances, tight unpatronising plotting, an exhilaratingly vague ending, some pretty horses - Michael Clayton had it all in spades, plus if there's been a more chilling cinematic death scene in recent years I'd very much like to see it. And, yes, I know it's a George Clooney film, but at least it isn't Ocean's Thirteen so shut up.

C J Davies

It's actually been something of a downright shoddy year for cinema. Tarantino's 'long-awaited' Grindhouse was one of the most tedious and uninvolving things I've ever seen, Spider-Man 3, 300 and Pirates Of The Caribbean: Whatever Sequel We're On set new benchmarks for incoherent pointlessness, while The Simpsons Movie may well go down in history as one of the biggest disappointments popular culture has endured. Ten years in the making and about four good jokes? Well done, guys.

So. The 'good' ones, then. Well… although it was made in 2006, it was only released in the UK in April this year, so I guess I can legitimately claim that The Lives Of Others kicked the arse of everything else released on our blustery shores. Although The Bourne Ultimatum wasn't too bad.

Shawn Lindseth

My choice for movie of the year would have to be Beowulf in 3-D. I found myself ducking spears, dodging arrows, and perhaps most importantly vomiting in my popcorn bucket every time Angelina Jolie seemed to float out of the lake and touch me. Not to worry as that day I'd only eaten sticks of butter.

My chief problem with her is I know she's visited AIDS countries, and I'm not exactly sure how the disease spreads. My friend Joey says he got it from a gas station toilet. Since we're on that topic, poor sick Joey probably needs money from you guys too.

'Tis still the season, after all.

Chris Laverty

There have been a lot of good films this year: Control, The Bourne Ultimatum, Death Proof, Becoming Jane. There was also Elizabeth: The Golden Age, which made me jab my own testicles with my reviewing pen just to stay awake (it felt so good that afterwards I joined a site).

The best of the best for me though has to be Beowulf. Like an old Ray Harryhausen monster movie that charms you awake from a coffee crème-induced coma every festive holiday, Robert Zemeckis' bonkers animated/live action mash-up takes a big thick bite of stupid and runs with it.

Dragons, some icky thing that screams, wenches, sea serpents – it's fun, and that is a damn nice place to visit when sat in a room surrounded by total strangers who smell of nachos for two hours.

Matthew Laidlow

I wasn’t sure what to make of Die Hard 4.0. Sure, it was hyped up from every critic everywhere. Whilst this usually puts me of, I wasn’t at all when I was in the cinema eating my overpriced popcorn and hotdog combo. For any normal person doing what he does, they would have been killed pretty much after the first ten minutes. But not John McClane. It takes a bloke of some calibre to not get injured after being chased by a fighter jet destroying the motorway as he drives a truck in a load of traffic. He’s like an action clown who should do parties for adults to keep them amused. Over the top action + explosions = awesome in my book.

Annette Hyde

After deeply pondering the movies released in 2008, I realised I am lagging in my movie-viewing to a disgraceful degree. How in the name of holy heaven have I seen Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, and pretty much nothing else? Therefore, I have based my Top Movie choice based on the most objective, sophisticated, well respected qualification: actors I think are really hot and stuff. Based on this, my choice is The Prestige. Cool movie, hot Christian Bale. He’s Batman, for the love of Pete. Batman. I am sorry I have no further depth to offer.

Tomorrow – our best TV shows of the year. But, hey, why not leave your best movie choices in the comment box beneath? We might even get around to moderating them sometime before the new year, too. 

As far as ancient English epic poems go, Beowulf is probably the cockniest – and that's based on Ray Winstone screaming the word "MONSTAH" in the Beowulf trailer we saw.

But, hey, it seems like Americans like nothing more than computer-generated movies based on ancient English epic poems starring markedly skinnier versions of tubby cockney actors who, admittedly, could still shatter our skulls with one blow of their tiny cockney fists if they wanted to. That's because the Ray Winstone-starring Beowulf is number one at the US weekend box office – a remarkable achievement for a film that's basically one long PlayStation 2 videogame cut-scene that was written almost 1,500 years ago. Still, Beowulf's weekend box office success goes to show that all it takes to bridge the chasm between ancient literature buffs and the young post-MTV generation is Angelina Jolie's tits and some blood.

Nobody could have really anticipated Beowulf becoming the weekend box office number one movie, but that's only because previous Robert Zemeckis-affiliated motion capture efforts like The Polar Express and Monster House have basically spooked the balls off anyone who saw them. But the technology behind the movies is developing rapidly – so much so that where once Beowulf would have been a ghostly, vaguely nightmarish display of ambition over hardware, the process can now produce weekend box office-topping movies that can accurately portray what Angelina Jolie would look like if she was still sexy instead of being the skinny woman who adopts everyone that everyone knows her as now. Here's the US weekend box office top five…

1 - Beowulf (Now that Beowulf is a weekend box office success, we can look forward to seeing other ancient English epic poems being adapted into movies, like Waldere or That Time Old Mrs Higgins From Number 23 Tried To Go The The Post Office But Didn't Have The Right Change On Her, The Silly Moo) $28,100,000

2 - Bee Movie (If only Bee Movie had taken Beowulf's lead, maybe it would have stayed at the weekend box office number one for longer. And by that we mean replacing Jerry Seinfeld's voice with that of a football hooligan screaming "I! AM! A! FACKIN'! BEEEE!") $14,300,000

3 - American Gangster (Quickly falling down the weekend box office top five, although maybe that's a good thing. After all, a comparative box office failure could be just what Denzel Washington needs if it's to stop Ridley Scott from coercing him into making the black A Good Year) $13,218,000

4 - Fred Claus (Between this, Shoot 'Em Up, The Lady In The Water and The Illusionist, we're starting to think that Paul Giamatti isn't quite the genius we thought he was. No pithy jokes here, just a kind of ambient wish that Paul Giamatti would start making better films) $12,000,000

5 - Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (We're guessing this Dustin Hoffman and Natalie Portman-starring movie only had a weekend box office debut of number five because people would rather smash their head in with a rock than say "Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, please" to another living human being) $10,025,000

Read more:

Weekend Box Office – Box Office Mojo 

When Angelina Jolie made Beowulf, she knew she was making the tricky transition between 'ultra-earnest humanitarian actress' to 'mostly-naked computer-generated Old English mythical half-sex lizard from the year 700 AD.'

And of all the transitions a woman can make, it's probably the hardest one – one minute you're crying over pictures of sad third-world orphans and the next minute you're having your head chopped off by Ray Winstone's virtual sword in a sexy way – but it's one that Angelina Jolie can make without even breaking her stride. And how did Angelina Jolie do this? By turning up to the London Beowulf premiere in a pair of leather trousers so skin-tight that her bum-stitches burst wide open, forcing Brad Pitt to spend the rest of the evening trying to cover up Angelina's arse-spillage with his hands, that's how!

Angelina Jolie has travelled to some of the world's most desolate places, either in her much-vaunted role as a UN-appointed humanitarian ambassador or just because she heard they were selling orphans off cheaply there. But our point is that Angelina Jolie thrives in these places, whether she's giving birth in Namibia or moving to New Orleans just to raise the spirits of the flood-ravaged locals.

But those places were a piece of cake compared to London, where everything literally fell to pieces for Angelina Jolie.

This weekend Angelina Jolie attended the London premiere of her new movie Beowulf with Brad Pitt and, even though it's just her voice and a clump of pixels mashed into a vaguely Jolie shape in the movie, Angelina decided to give the red carpet crowd exactly what they wanted.

Smiles and autographs? Yes, but we don't mean that. A full-on smooch with Brad Pitt in front of the world's press? That happened too, but what we're talking about is Angelina Jolie turning up in a pair of trousers so tight that the bum-seam split wide open, meaning that Brad Pitt had to spend the rest of the premiere with his hand clamped over Angelina's arse like some sort of dirty bum pervert.

If Angelina Jolie's bum-split wasn't bad enough, she also managed to tread in a wad of chewing gum as well, messing up her Christian Louboutin stilettos in the process. But, hey, it could be worse – as far as wardrobe malfunctions go, split trousers and gummy shoes are fairly minimal. It's not as if Angelina Jolie kicked an old pair of knickers out from the bottom of her trousers, is it?

And, seriously, since the average Londoner's day involves standing in a dirty, sweltering, expensive, overcrowded tin can snaking underneath the city with their face rammed into a sweaty bloke's stinking armpit, constantly worrying that overzealous police marksmen will shoot them dead just because they look a bit foreign, we'd say Angelina got off lightly.

Plus, by bursting her trousers open, Angelina Jolie has secured Beowulf more publicity than it was ever going to get. Let's just all be thankful that Tom Cruise didn't choose to do something similar at the London premiere of Lions For Lambs.