Some of the best animated films have seen anthropomorphic apes, sentient spiders, and talking animals of all kinds. For years, movie companies have created animal classics telling the stories from Disney’s giant family of Dalmatians in 101 Dalmatians, all the way to Illumination’s more recent singing competition among humanlike wild creatures in Sing and Sing 2. But sometimes animation studios take these cartoon critters and bring them to the real world. If they can speak in a cartoon, why not speak in real life? It’s only a movie after all.
Whether original concepts or adaptation of children’s novels, talking animals have become a recognizable trope in both animated and live-action movies, to the point where they aren’t even out of the ordinary to the human characters. It may appear that these movies are often directed towards kids and families but, every now and then, there comes a different target audience with a raunchy adult motion picture like Ted, The Cat in the Hat, which was aimed for children but riddled with grown up innuendos, or the box office failure Cats, whose objective demographic solely included people who like to make fun of films. Nevertheless, movie studios have delivered more than enough live-action talking animal films and here are some of the best, ranked.
8 Air Buddies
Arguably one of the best dog movies of all time, Disney’s Air Bud series focused predominantly on a sport-playing golden retriever. Debuting in 1997, each of the five movies found the titular dog tackling a new recreational activity. In 2006, however, the spotlight shifted to his puppy babies who, unlike him, for some reason were capable of speaking. Air Buddies followed five young dogs who dealt with new lively adventures in each film. Where Air Bud was always playing sports with his owners, the puppies were on their own. Sometimes they were in Alaska, sometimes they were Indiana Jones, and once they even, believe it or not, went to space. Air Buddies had a total of seven direct-to-DVD movies and after that the franchise picked up for another spinoff called Santa Paws.
7 Alvin and the Chipmunks
Music videos, TV shows, movies, more TV shows – Alvin and the Chipmunks have been around since the 1950s, and to this day, Nickelodeon is still running a CGI version of the lives of Alvin, Simon and Theodore. In 2007, a movie showing their first interaction with their owner and music manager Dave Seville was released, and it was succeeded by three sequels. Though the films were criticized for their “rehashed kids movie formula” — with one of the films centering on a road trip, a trope seen in many kids’ family films from 1995’s A Goofy Movie to 2021’s The Addams Family 2 — they still performed successfully at the box office and became enjoyable family flicks. No wonder, considering the mass popularity of the singing rodents who make Christmas every year with their hit “Christmas Don’t Be Late.”
6 Dolittle
Doctor Dolittle starred in a series of children’s novels by Hugh Lofting, telling the story of a physician who can speak to animals. It was first adapted for the big screen for a musical film in 1967 and later revived for a film starring Eddie Murphy. After a sequel and three spinoffs, the series returned once more for another movie starring Robert Downey Jr. called Dolittle. The 2020 fantasy film featured an all-star voice cast including Antonio Banderas, Emma Thompson, and Octavia Spencer. The movie told a different story from its predecessor, following Dr. Dolittle on a journey to a mysterious island to find medicine to cure the ailing Queen Victoria. The motion picture was ultimately a failure and was nominated for six Golden Raspberry Awards. Still, the movie was enjoyable to some as it has a 76% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.
5 Scooby-Doo
Like Alvin and the Chipmunks, Scooby-Doo has been around for decades, first premiering in 1969. After many animated movies, shows, and television specials, Warner Brothers created a live-action Scooby-Doo movie with the same characters fans know and love. While it saw many interpretations afterwards, the 2002 mystery, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze Jr., Linda Cardenelli, Matthew Lillard and Neil Fanning as the voice of Scooby, has remained a cult classic. The movie sees the gang reunite for another conundrum after spending years apart and once they end up at a spooky amusement park, things begin going kooky, leading them to work together again. The movie had a sequel two years later titled Monsters Unleashed and since then, the Scooby-Doo franchise has lived on, with a Velma prequel series coming soon to HBO Max.
4 Stuart Little
The story of a family who takes a little white mouse is based on a 1945 novel by E.B. White and was adapted for a film over 50 years later. Stuart Little follows a mouse who gets adopted into a family, but as a son rather than a pet. Their actual pet – a cat named Snowbell – is the problem, however, when he decides he wants to eat our main character. Rest assured, the movie is a beloved family-friendly film that performed successfully and is classic to this day. After Stuart Little, the franchise added two more films with the third being completely animated. A remake was announced in 2015, but there has been no mention of it recently, so whether Sony goes through with it or not, the original movie will go down in history.
3 The Jungle Book
The Jungle Book was one of Disney’s many live-action adaptations and like the 1967 animated film, it follows a child named Mowgli living amongst animals deep in the jungle. With only one human actor, The Jungle Book’s cast consisted largely of voice work from names like Bill Murray, Idris Elba, and Scarlett Johansson. Each voice actor played an animal that was animated so well, you’d think it was real if it weren’t for the fact that they speak. With a bear, a panther, a tiger, and a python, to name a few, The Jungle Book is filled with different animals of the wild who surprisingly accept Mowgli as one of their own.
2 Paddington
Another book-based movie is Paddington, a film that tells the story of a Peruvian bear who travels to London to find a home. And that he does, once a British family takes him in and names him after the Paddington Station he was lost at. Paddington was praised for its appeal to both children and adults and received two BAFTA nominations as well as a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes. The movie is a feel-good film, the kind you can watch and feel as if you’ve just been hugged by a warm, fluffy bear like the title character. It was good enough to earn a sequel, with a third movie in development.
1 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Among the many chapter books kids read in school is undoubtedly The Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis. With three films, the movies centered on the Pevensie children during World War 2. Among the talking animals in the movie are Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, Mr. Fox, and Aslan, a lion played by Liam Neeson. The movies also had part human/part animal creatures such as a centaur, minotaur and faun. The first film, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe had won multiple awards for best makeup and given that Netflix has picked up the story, the future holds more animated and humanlike animals.