High school recruiting isn't the only way to build a winner in the transfer portal eraHigh school recruiting isn't the only way to build a winner in the transfer portal eraMinisters told ‘incompetence’ at Met Office led to underestimation of Storm Bert

Texas A&M signed the nation’s top-ranked recruiting class three years ago believing it had built a potential national title contender. Plenty of players from that heralded 2022 class could indeed be participating in the first 12-team College Football Playoff this month. They just won’t be doing it for the Aggies, who no longer have nearly half their 2022 signees. The list of 2022 recruits now with playoff contenders elsewhere includes Mississippi defensive lineman Walter Nolen, Oregon wide receiver Evan Stewart, Alabama defensive lineman LT Overton, SMU offensive tackle PJ Williams and injured Boise State receiver Chris Marshall. Texas A&M has done all right without them, going 8-4 as transfers filled about half the starting roles. Texas A&M represents perhaps the clearest example of how recruiting and roster construction have changed in the era of loosened transfer restrictions. Coaches must assemble high school classes without always knowing which of their own players are transferring and what players from other schools could be available through the portal. People are also reading... “It used to be you lost 20 seniors, you signed 20 incoming freshmen,” Duke coach Manny Diaz said. “You just had your numbers right. Now you might lose 20 seniors, but you might lose 20 underclassmen. You just don’t know.” Is high school recruiting losing value? Coaches emphasize that high school recruiting remains critical, but recent results suggest it isn’t as vital as before. The last two College Football Playoff runners-up – TCU in 2022 and Washington in 2023 – didn’t sign a single top-15 class in any of the four years leading up their postseason runs, according to composite rankings of recruiting sites compiled by 247Sports. This year’s contenders have shown there’s more than one way to build a championship-caliber roster. About half of No. 1 Oregon’s usual starters began their college careers elsewhere. No. 5 Georgia, which annually signs one of the nation’s top high school classes, has only a few transfers making major contributions. Colorado’s rise under Deion Sanders exemplifies how a team can win without elite high school recruiting. None of Colorado’s last four classes have ranked higher than 30th in the 247Sports Composite. Three ranked 47th or lower. “If anybody ever did the homework and the statistics of these young men – people have a class that they say is the No. 1 class in the nation – then five of those guys play, or four of those guys play, then the rest go through the spring and then they jump in the portal,” Sanders said. “Don’t give me the number of where you rank (in recruiting standings), because it’s like an NFL team," he added. "You always say who won the draft, then the team gets killed all year (and) you don’t say nothing else about it. Who won the draft last year in the NFL? Nobody cares right now, right?” Wisconsin's Christian Alliegro tries to stop Oregon's Evan Stewart, right, during the first half of a Nov. 16 game in Madison, Wis. Morry Gash, Associated Press The busy transfer portal Star quarterback Shedeur Sanders followed his father from Jackson State to Colorado in 2023, and Heisman Trophy front-runner Travis Hunter accompanied them. According to Colorado, this year’s Buffaloes team has 50 transfer newcomers, trailing only North Texas’ 54 among Bowl Subdivision programs. Relying on transfers comes with caveats. Consider Florida State's rise and fall. Florida State posted an unbeaten regular-season record last year with transfers playing leading roles. When those transfers departed and Florida State's portal additions this year didn't work out, the Seminoles went 2-10. “There has to be some type of balance between the transfer portal and high school recruiting,” said Andrew Ivins, the director of scouting for 247Sports. “I compare it to the NFL. The players from the transfer portal are your free agents and high school recruiting is your NFL draft picks.” A look at the composite rankings of recruiting sites compiled by 247Sports for the 2020-22 classes shows at least 40 of the top 100 prospects each of those years ended up leaving their original school. Coaches must decide which positions they’re better off building with high school prospects and which spots might be easier to fill through the portal. “The ones that have a ton of learning to do - tight end, quarterback, interior offensive line, inside linebacker, safety, where they are the communicators - they are the guys that are processing a lot of information,” Florida’s Billy Napier said. “Those are the ones in a perfect world you have around for a while. “It’s easier to play defensive line, edge, corner, receiver, running back, tackle, specialists. Those are a little bit more plug-and-play I’d say, in my opinion," Napier said. "Either way, it’s not necessarily about that. It’s just about we need a certain number at each spot, and we do the best we can to fill those roles.” Colorado head coach Deion Sanders, right, congratulates place kicker Cristiano Palazzo after he kicked an extra point during the second half of Friday's game against Oklahoma Stat in Boulder, Colo. David Zalubowski, Associated Press Transfer portal ripple effects Power Four programs aren’t the only ones facing a balancing act between recruiting high schools and mining the transfer portal. Group of Five schools encounter similar challenges. “We’re recruiting every position and bringing in a high school class,” Eastern Michigan coach Chris Creighton said. “That’s not going to be maybe 24 scholarship guys like it used to be. It might be more like 16. It’s not four d-linemen necessarily, right? It might be three. It might not be three receivers. It might be two. And it might not be five offensive linemen. It’s two to three.” The extra hurdle Group of Five schools face is the possibility their top performers might leave for a power-conference program with more lucrative name, image and likeness financial opportunities. They sometimes don’t know which players they’ll lose. “We know who they’re trying to steal,” Miami (Ohio) coach Chuck Martin quipped. “We just don’t know who they’re going to steal.” The obstacles facing coaches are only getting steeper as FBS teams prepare for a 105-man roster limit as part of the fallout from a pending $2.8 billion NCAA antitrust settlement. While having 105 players on scholarship seems like an upgrade from the current 85-man scholarship limit, many rosters have about 125 players once walk-ons are included. Nebraska coach Matt Rhule said last week his program would probably end up with about 30-50 players in the portal due to the new roster restrictions. Is there college free agency? All the added dimensions to roster construction in the college game have drawn parallels to the NFL, but Minnesota coach P.J. Fleck believes those comparisons are misleading. “When people talk about college football right now, they’re saying, ‘Oh, we have an NFL model,’ or it’s kind of moving toward the NFL,” Fleck said. “First of all, it’s nothing like the NFL. There’s a collective bargaining agreement (in the NFL). There’s a true salary cap for everybody. It’s designed for all 32 fan bases to win the Super Bowl maybe once every 32 years – and I know other people are winning that a lot more than others – but that’s how it’s designed. In college football, it’s not that way.” There does seem to be a bit more competitive balance than before. The emergence of TCU and Washington the last couple of postseasons indicates this new era of college football has produced more unpredictability. Yet it’s also created many more challenges as coaches try to figure out how to put together their rosters. “It’s difficult because we’re just kind of inventing it on the fly, right?” Diaz said. Sports Week in Photos: NBA Cup, NFL snow game and more Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen, foreground right, dives toward the end zone to score past San Francisco 49ers defensive end Robert Beal Jr. (51) and linebacker Dee Winters during the second half of an NFL football game in Orchard Park, N.Y., Sunday, Dec. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Adrian Kraus) Adrian Kraus Houston Rockets guard Jalen Green goes up for a dunk during the second half of an Emirates NBA cup basketball game against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr) Abbie Parr South Carolina guard Maddy McDaniel (1) drives to the basket against UCLA forward Janiah Barker (0) and center Lauren Betts (51) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game, Sunday, Nov. 24, 2024, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Eric Thayer) Eric Thayer LSU punter Peyton Todd (38) kneels in prayer before an NCAA college football game against Oklahoma in Baton Rouge, La., Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. LSU won 37-17. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert) Gerald Herbert South Africa's captain Temba Bavuma misses a catch during the fourth day of the first Test cricket match between South Africa and Sri Lanka, at Kingsmead stadium in Durban, South Africa, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. 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(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty) Robert F. Bukaty New York Islanders goaltender Ilya Sorokin cools off during first period of an NHL hockey game against the Boston Bruins, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024, in Elmont, N.Y. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson) Julia Demaree Nikhinson Brazil's Amanda Gutierres, second right, is congratulated by teammate Yasmin, right, after scoring her team's first goal during a soccer international between Brazil and Australia in Brisbane, Australia, Thursday, Nov. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Pat Hoelscher) Pat Hoelscher Las Vegas Raiders tight end Brock Bowers (89) tries to leap over Kansas City Chiefs cornerback Joshua Williams (2) during the first half of an NFL football game in Kansas City, Mo., Friday, Nov. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ed Zurga) Ed Zurga Luiz Henrique of Brazil's Botafogo, right. is fouled by goalkeeper Everson of Brazil's Atletico Mineiro inside the penalty area during a Copa Libertadores final soccer match at Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko) Natacha Pisarenko England's Alessia Russo, left, and United States' Naomi Girma challenge for the ball during the International friendly women soccer match between England and United States at Wembley stadium in London, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth) Kirsty Wigglesworth Gold medalists Team Netherlands competes in the Team Sprint Women race of the ISU World Cup Speed Skating Beijing 2024 held at the National Speed Skating Oval in Beijing, Sunday, Dec. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan) Ng Han Guan Melanie Meillard, center, of Switzerland, competes during the second run in a women's World Cup slalom skiing race, Sunday, Dec. 1, 2024, in Killington, Vt. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty) Robert F. Bukaty Mari Fukada of Japan falls as she competes in the women's Snowboard Big Air qualifying round during the FIS Snowboard & Freeski World Cup 2024 at the Shougang Park in Beijing, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Andy Wong Seattle Kraken fans react after a goal by center Matty Beniers against the San Jose Sharks was disallowed due to goaltender interference during the third period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024, in Seattle. The Sharks won 4-2. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson) Lindsey Wasson Mathilde Gremaud of Switzerland competes in the women's Freeski Big Air qualifying round during the FIS Snowboard & Freeski World Cup 2024 at the Shougang Park in Beijing, Friday, Nov. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Andy Wong) Andy Wong Minnesota Vikings running back Aaron Jones (33) reaches for an incomplete pass ahead of Arizona Cardinals linebacker Mack Wilson Sr. (2) during the second half of an NFL football game Sunday, Dec. 1, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr) Abbie Parr Be the first to knowI'm A Celebrity fans say same thing as Ant and Dec take swipe at Dean McCullough again

We’re taking a look back at some of our favourite and most popular Entertainment stories of 2024 , giving you a chance to catch up on some of the great reading you might have missed this year. In this story from October, we count down the 25 best animated films, ideal for inspiration if the kids are already bored with their Christmas presents. For years it was the superheroes who were saving Hollywood. From Spider-Man to Batman to, belatedly, a few women — the comic-book movie became a multibillion-dollar ballast for a business struggling to make money in a world of streaming and smartphones. But then, like Superman faced with kryptonite, said superheroes started to weaken and their fickle audiences moved on as studio execs started to panic. Who, they gasped, would save Hollywood now? Well, step forward ... cartoons. Lots of them. In a previous life the top of the box-office charts would be full of Oscar-worthy adult movies — but the days of cinema being dominated by serious dramatic fare are long gone. Five of the top 20 highest-grossing films worldwide this year were animated — and three of those five were among the top six money-makers. Such is the domination that the biggest film this year is Inside Out 2 , the sequel starring new emotions in the teenager Riley’s brain. It was the fastest film to date to reach US$1 billion (from box offices around the world) and that’s with half the publicity of a film like, say, Barbie , which made far less money. Meanwhile, Despicable Me 4 was the third-highest earner of the year and Kung Fu Panda 4 landed at No 6. “Entering the summer, the marketplace was suffering a malaise — a year-to-date downturn with films not living up to expectations,” says Paul Dergarabedian, an analyst for the global media company Comscore. “Then family movies became the saviour of box office.” This is glorious for Hollywood. In 2020, when Trolls World Tour became the first film of the pandemic to be released at home at the same time as in cinemas, entire pricing structures fell into jeopardy. A family of four in the UK gathered around a TV would pay £20 to stream Trolls World Tour instead of north of £50 for four multiplex tickets and some overpriced popcorn and drinks. Losing that income for ever would have been fatal for the industry, but the success of Inside Out 2 and its ilk has brought back multigenerational family entertainment — something Marvel and DC superhero franchises never pulled off — when studios needed it most. Dave Holstein, a writer on Inside Out 2 , describes the film as “many movies in one. My six-year-old thinks it’s the funniest he’s seen. My mum thinks it’s the saddest. And when my son sees it again in 10 years he’ll have a whole different movie to watch.” By the end of this year the blockbusters with actual actors in them — The Fall Guy , Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, Dune: Part Two — will be further sidelined by the arrival of Moana 2 (the first Moana earned US$600 million) and Mufasa: The Lion King (the 2019 Lion King reboot took US$1.6 billion). Even the king of rom-coms Richard Curtis is getting in on the act with a cartoon, That Christmas. And The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim has no A-listers in sight. Yet this year’s animation boom was not nearly as bright, gaudy and empty as the film posters tended to suggest. Yes, there was dross ( The Garfield Movie ) but more interestingly, more excitingly, it has brought a sense of creative expression and exuberance, as if animation is entering its baroque phase. Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim is delivered in beautifully rendered anime, making the screen look like the best room in an art gallery; while the masterly and meaningful The Wild Robot , out this weekend, is like watching ET , Finding Nemo and Bambi as drawn by Claude Monet. Inside Out 2 had equal quality, following the rich Pixar tradition of Up, Wall-E and Soul by tackling the biggest topics — such as loneliness and death — in a way that never felt patronising. “One of my favourite films of the past 20 years is Toy Story 3 ,” Miguel Gomes, the Portuguese arthouse film-maker who won best director at the Cannes Film Festival this year, told The Film Stage. “Pixar is closer to the idea of mainstream classical cinema than most of what is made today.” And Gomes’s enthusiasm is the crux of the animation boom, explaining why the backbone of Hollywood profit shifting from superhero to cartoon will become less of a trend and more of an era. Comic-book films lost their audience in the 2020s due to creative stagnation and a dwindling interest in periphery characters ( The Flash? Ant-Man ?), yet animation is a sandbox where artists can draw what they want. Such endless ideas will always have a chance of welcoming new fans, especially those who grew up with gaming culture. This is a key factor in why animation is having a moment — because the future of cinema depends on convincing Gen Z and Gen Alpha that a multiplex remains as appealing as it did before various devices littered the home. The signs are encouraging: 37 per cent of the audience at Inside Out 2 ′s opening weekend was made up of 18 to 34-year-olds, an age group who go to the cinema without parents but, crucially, without kids. Why are they watching a cartoon? Because for younger fans animation is serious storytelling, with their most beloved yarns in gaming on Xbox and PlayStation spun via that medium. Studios know this. They have been trying and failing to bring video games to the big screen for at least 20 years, since before Angelina Jolie played Lara Croft in 2001. But rather than mimic stories, what if they tried for the essence of a video game instead? The feel and the look — the myriad possibilities? That is what we have seen in animation this year, because if studios were able to transpose what people enjoy about consoles on to the big screen, then Hollywood will own the next generation. It will save itself. The 25 best animated films ranked - from Snow White to Up The Times critics pick their favourite cartoons that you can watch now. We’re living in an animation boom. Family-friendly cartoons are taking over the box office, with two of the biggest movies of 2024 so far being Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4 . The Pixar film, about the emotions inside a teenager’s brain, became the highest-grossing animated film ever, raking in over US$1.6 billion since its release. And now The Wild Robot hits cinemas, a new animated film from DreamWorks about a robot named Roz. It has already been praised by critics as a masterpiece. But what’s the best animated film? Here our critics rank the top 25 of all time — from Up to Waltz with Bashir . Did they get it right? 25. Frozen (2013, Disney+) Disney spent ten years trying to adapt Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale The Snow Queen and the result was this shimmering, frosted fantasy. It tells a simple yet compelling tale of two sisters, one with icy powers, and a snowman named Olaf who likes summer days. It has become a cultural touchstone that has spread its icy tips across the globe with merchandise, stage shows and ice shows — until Frozen 2 in 2019 it was the highest grossing animated film. Crammed with earworms, this is the movie your children won’t let you forget, no matter how hard you try to, err, let it go. 24. Inside Out (2015, Disney+) It’s a perennial question: what actually goes on inside our heads? Pixar’s imaginative film follows Riley, an ice-hockey obsessed 11-year-old, as she moves to San Francisco. But she isn’t the star of the show. Instead, viewers get a peek inside her mind where anthropomorphised versions of emotions — Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, Anger — struggle to keep control. It’s an abstract premise delivered with giddy, colourful characters. The film is at once a tearjerker and pure joy. Its sequel became the highest-grossing animated film ever. 23. The Jungle Book (1967, Disney+) In 1967 Disney needed a hit: the response to the studio’s previous feature The Sword in the Stone (1963) had been lacklustre and Walt had died of lung cancer at 65 the year before. Luckily they had this lively animated adaptation of the Rudyard Kipling classic in the bag. Stuffed with exuberant characters and a jumpin’ score, this film is pure fun. The star is Baloo, the loveable bear, and his infectious track The Bare Necessities . It was the last film overseen by Walt Disney — a magical note to bow out on. 22. James and the Giant Peach (1996, Disney+) Henry Sellick’s adaptation of Roald Dahl’s classic about a boy riding in a giant, runaway peach with a crew of ugly bugs matches Dahl’s mixture of spikiness and sparkiness almost exactly — the storytelling has a helium bounce thanks to inspired voice work by Simon Callow, Joanna Lumley, Richard Dreyfuss and Miriam Margolyes. The best Dahl adaptation before Wes Anderson got to work. 21. Monsters Inc (2001, Disney+) It’s not your typical plot for a children’s film: monsters elicit screams from children to power their glistening metropolis. Yet this is packed with warmth and cheerful high energy, delivered by a hairy blue-purple monster called Sulley, voiced by John Goodman, and his green pal Mike (Billy Crystal). At its heart it’s a tale of confronting one’s fears, but it never becomes bogged down. It’s full of gleeful gags and silliness (odorants called Wet Dog and Low Tide). How did it lose the Oscar to Shrek? A travesty. 20. Fantastic Mr Fox (2009, Disney+) This stop-motion animation and ingenious adaptation of Roald Dahl’s novel comes from the mind of one of Hollywood’s most idiosyncratic directors: Wes Anderson. The director, a lifelong Dahl fan who read the book as a child in Texas, teams up with the co-writer Noah Baumbach to dream up a story that extends beyond the poultry-stealing fox (voiced by George Clooney) and greedy farmers. This is a world of misfits, disaffected parents and troubled teenagers. Plus, there’s a farmhand voiced by the pop singer Jarvis Cocker. 19. Alice (1988, Mubi) The Czech surrealist Jan Svankmajer’s stop-motion version of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is one to give even adults the jitters. Alice’s transformations unfold with the logic of a bad dream, in which everyday objects — playing cards, china dolls, croquet mallets — take on spooky life and significance. Sure, there is some live action there, but it’s directed in a way that never distracts from the spectacular animation. Knocks the Disney version into a mad hatter’s hat. 18. My Neighbor Totoro (1988, Netflix) Hayao Miyazaki’s magical film is about two sisters who move to a creaky house near the hospital where their mother is being treated. They explore a visually enchanting world of their invention, a fantasy realm with a big, cuddly forest spirit and a “catbus”. Its friendly characters delight children, but its themes of wonderment and the thrill of exploration are great enough to awaken anyone’s inner child. The stage adaptation became a monster hit in the West End. 17. Pinocchio (1940, Disney+) Walt Disney didn’t like the Pinocchio of Carlo Calodi’s source novel very much and invented the character of Jiminy Cricket to give him a conscience, thus bequeathing to the studio its theme song: When You Wish Upon a Star , sung heartbreakingly by the singer-comedian Cliff Edwards. But the film remains one of the darker Disneys, and is all the more memorable for it. Remember how terrifying it is when Pinocchio transforms into a donkey? 16. Waltz with Bashir (2008, buy/rent Apple TV) Think animation can’t tackle challenging subject matter? Just watch this haunting movie, which brings to life the dreams and traumatic memories of the Israeli soldiers who fought with Lebanese forces against the Palestine Liberation Organisation and Syria in the 1982 Lebanon war. The Israeli director Ari Folman uses his shattered recollections as a soldier during the conflict and interviews with others who were there to create a nightmarish vision, a vivid and brutal portrait of the horrors of war. Still as pertinent as ever, this is a stunning anti-war film. 15. The Wild Robot (2024, in cinemas now) Chris Sanders has crafted a joyous film — warm, wise and funny — about oddball parenting. It tells the story of a robot (Lupita Nyong’o) who is washed up on the shore and has to adapt to its new surroundings. The director has focused his movie on the emotions and experience of parenthood, particularly when those parents happen to be slightly different. Anybody who has found themselves thrust into parenthood without a user’s manual — which is to say, just about everybody — will feel understood. Knockouts don’t come much cleaner than this. 14. Watership Down (1978, buy/rent Apple TV) Martin Rosen’s labour-of-love adaptation of Richard Adams’s bestseller about a warren of Hampshire rabbits forced into exile, featuring the voices of John Hurt, Richard Briars and Nigel Hawthorne, is not for those craving Disney cuteness. It’s a bloody, tooth-and-claw survival epic, bristling with violent predators and lurking threats, aimed at old souls who can still hum the tune to Art Garfunkel’s melancholy theme song, Bright Eyes . 13. Up (2009, Disney+) Is there a more traumatic movie scene than the first ten minutes of this animation? It captures the life of Carl (voiced by Ed Asner), the 78-year-old widower, from first love to the death of his wife. Heartbreaking. Next up, an adventure to visit the mythical lost worlds of South America, courtesy of the thousands of balloons he ties to the roof of his house. His companion is a freckled eight-year-old named Russell (Jordan Nagai). The film, which opened at Cannes in 2009, has a simple message: you’re never too old for an adventure. Just wonderful. 12. The Incredibles (2004, Disney+) Brad Bird’s retro-futurist hymn to space-age architecture, Bond villain lairs, couturiers inspired by the costume designer Edith Head (“Dahlink!”) and jetpacks — what more could you want? The zippiest Pixar, as well as the funniest, The Incredibles is executed with more craft, invention and wit than most of the superhero movies it spoofs. 11. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993, Disney+) This started life as a poem that Tim Burton wrote while working as a junior animator at Disney. It became a witty, dark, wonderfully inventive fable about a takeover of Christmas by a village of spindly Halloween ghouls. The film mixes dark barbs and twinkly charm. Burton’s Edward Gorey-style designs receive cantering accompaniment in Danny Elfman’s antic score so that the production at times seems possessed by some mischievous spirit. 10. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018, Neon) After a torrent of half-baked superhero films, this animation felt refreshing. Produced by The Lego Movie ’s Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, its innovative design, quick-witted humour and mind-bending storytelling took modern animation into a different universe. At the centre of the tale is Miles Morales, a Brooklyn schoolboy, who teams up with all sorts of spider heroes, including a jaded middle-aged Spider-Man and a radioactive pig. The Oscar winner for best animated feature is busy but never overwhelming. It’s zippy, entertaining — and proved there was life yet in caped crusaders. 9. Wallace & Gromit: The Wrong Trousers (1993) Before Nick Park’s work acquired the scale and spectacle of Hollywood features, The Wrong Trousers with its techno trousers and penguin arch-villain got the balance with the more humdrum, homespun elements of the series exactly right. The film may be just 30 minutes long, but it took eight months to make. And the climax, featuring a death-defying run round a train set is an unimprovable mixture of thrills and slapstick. Buster Keaton would be proud. 8. Beauty and the Beast (1991, Disney+) Howard Ashman was dying of Aids when he wrote the lyrics for this glorious film with the composer Alan Menken. The duo had resurrected Disney’s fortunes in the 1980s with The Little Mermaid , but this was their magnum opus, a tale of a headstrong bibliophile who is held captive by a beast. Steeped in enchanting moments and bursting with colourful characters, this film looks gorgeous and combines the traditions of the past with the spectacle of a Broadway musical. It earned the first best picture Oscar nomination for an animated movie, an impressive feat for a medium so often dismissed. 7. Wall-E (2008, Disney+) One small step for a robot, one giant leap for animation. Pixar’s epic space adventure, about the last robot left on Earth, was an impressive move forward in technology, proving that animation could make you forget what you’re watching isn’t real. Andrew Stanton, who started his career as a writer on Toy Story , directs the tale of a droid clearing up the mess that mankind left behind while they’re getting fat on space cruises. Much of it unfolds like a silent movie with the whirring bot’s only accompaniment, at the start, an old Betamax tape of Hello, Dolly! . The artistic risk pays off — it’s animation’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. 6. Snow White (1937, Disney+) The Citizen Kane of animated features, the one that proved that a full-length animated feature was even possible, swept along by the obsession and storytelling verve of Walt Disney. While making it, he could practically run the entire film — every cut, fade-out, line of dialogue — in his sleep. The big gamble to make this — Walt’s “folly” — paid off and more than just a film, a new form was born. Adriana Caselotti, who was the voice of Snow White, was not credited for her role. She went on to have small parts in The Wizard of Oz and It’s a Wonderful Life (singing in Martini’s bar). 5. The Lion King (1994, Disney+) Of all the more recent Disneys The Lion King is the one with the simplicity of old — it’s basically Bambi in Africa — but the desert landscapes, soaring songs and basso profundo of James Earl Jones all give Rob Minkoff and Roger Allers’s film an epic sweep worthy of that continent. So dedicated were the animators that lions were brought into the studio to study. The voice work is among Disney’s best and Jeremy Irons’s Scar the most seductive Disney bad guy since Shere Khan. 4. Spirited Away (2001, Netflix) This film, which won the director Hayao Miyazaki his first Oscar, centres on ten-year-old Chihiro, whose family’s move to a new town takes a fantastical turn. Her parents have turned into pigs and she’s soon on a journey with supernatural beings, including a six-legged man and a grotesque sludge creature in a psychedelic bath house. It knows that it’s weird, that it’s not very Disney — but that doesn’t stop us from admiring its beauty and brashness. This is animation as art and Miyazaki’s most outlandish and ambitious Studio Ghibli picture. 3. Bambi (1942, Disney+) Completed in the aftermath of the death of Walt Disney’s mother, Bambi ’s purity of line and emotion make it the most poetic of all the Disneys. The storytelling has the economy and enchantment of fable. The first Disney feature to do without humans, except as a threat, it’s a film children can just pour themselves into. They are Bambi and Thumper. Originally there was a shot in the scene where Bambi’s mother dies, but the screenwriter Larry Morey felt that it was more powerful to have it happen off screen. 2. The Iron Giant (1999, buy/rent Apple TV) The characters of Ted Hughes’s The Iron Man are transplanted from 1950s England to rural Maine with barely a scratch, unlike the crash-landed robot. Like Steven Spielberg’s ET: the Extra-Terrestrial , the film is the simplest of love stories — boy finds robot, boy loses robot, robot slowly reassembles himself screw by screw — told with such sweetness and charm you could forget there’s a cold war going on. It began as a musical with the Who guitarist Pete Townshend involved. 1. Toy Story 3 (2010, Disney+) The first Toy Story , the first computer-generated feature film, was a mix of groundbreaking tech, narrative ingenuity and heart — the space ranger Buzz proving he’s the real deal by soaring around the bedroom, or as he calls it “falling with style” — but it was Toy Story 3 that had us reaching for the tissues. There is an escape from Colditz, a great Barbie-Ken subplot (with voice work from Michael Keaton and Jodie Benson) and a backstory for Ned Beatty’s Lots-o’-Huggin’ Bear that is a small masterpiece of storytelling and heart-tugging pathos. It became the second Pixar film (after Up ) to receive an Academy award nomination for best picture. Don’t bother with the mediocre fourth film — this goodbye is the equal of the one in Brief Encounter . Pixar has taken us on a journey with these toys, and this film was a flawless conclusion. Written by: Jonathan Dean, Tom Shone and Jake Helm © The Times of London Share this article Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read. Copy Link Email Facebook Twitter/X LinkedIn RedditNew Delhi: Delhi High Court halted the counting of votes in the student union elections at Delhi University and delayed the declaration of results till the walls and public properties defaced by election posters and graffiti were restored. While this intervention led to the sprucing up of campus property, the law, in actuality, is hardly a deterrent to the widespread pasting of posters and banners on public property and spaces across the city. When TOI took a round of the city, it saw walls littered by advertisements of all sizes and hues, ranging from detective services and promises of 100% cancer treatment to job recruitment offers and, of course, those with political messages. IPL 2025 mega auction IPL Auction 2025: Who went where and for how much IPL 2025: Complete list of players of each franchise Not surprisingly, police data shows a 106% increase in cases registered for defacement of public property this year from 2023. Till Oct 31, police filed 2,450 cases for the offence against 1,187 in the same period last year, 798 I 2022 and 87 three years ago. This year, the cops took in 2,256 violators when only 1,017 had been nabbed last year, 392 in 2022 and 60 in 2021. The mass pasting of posters and bills on public property is likely to blemish the city's look with assembly elections slated just months away. Already, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Marg is plastered with posters or paintings put up by political parties announcing rallies. And while police claimed their investigators questioned the poster pasters, printing press and the beneficiaries of the content on posters, the impunity with which public properties are defaced indicates laxity in the enforcement of the Prevention of Defacement of Property Act. Hawker Mohammad Yasin Ansari said such acts tarnished the city's aesthetics. "But nobody objects to the pasting because doing so culminates in arguments and scuffles," he said. Lawyer Sube Singh pointed out how the posters were layered on top of each other. "If someone posts something, others paste theirs above it and more, in turn, place theirs on top of that, creating an overall unsightly scene," he said. On the flyover connecting Kashmere Gate to northeast Delhi, there are a plethora of posters of political parties. The flyover near Andrews Ganj in south Delhi is pockmarked by paper. In Saket, political party posters take up all the wall space along Birla Vidya Niketan Marg. Ajay Pratap, a resident of Chirag Delhi, said that these posters increase during elections. Near Tis Hazari Courts, the irony of signs warning against pasting of posters being merrily flouted couldn't be missed. Madan Kumar, 47, a Bhajanpura resident who was at the court, shrugged and said as soon as the authorities removed the posters and repainted the walls, new ones appeared routinely. At a flyover near Monastery Market, the beautiful graffiti inscribed for the G20 Summit last year has been marred by posters. Someone has scribbled six-seven lines in Hindi at one spot. The law prescribes a prison term of up to six months and a fine of up to Rs 1,000 or both for defacing public property by "writing or marking with ink, chalk, paint, or any other material, except for the purpose of indicating the memo and address of the owner or occupier of such property". A senior police officer said cases were registered based on complaints or when the cops take cognisance of the offence themselves. "We send notices and violators are made to join the investigation, or are bound down, or apprehended," the officer added. The cops revealed that most beneficiaries of posters plead they weren't directly involved in defacing public property.

Advertisement Intel's CEO departure reignited debate on splitting its factories from the company. Intel's fabs are costly, but they're also considered vital for US national security. CHIPS Act funding requires Intel to maintain majority control of its foundry. One central question has been hanging over Intel for months: Should the 56-year-old Silicon Valley legend separate its chip factories, or fabs, from the rest of the company? Intel's departing CEO, Pat Gelsinger, has opposed that strategy. As a longtime champion of the company's chip manufacturing efforts, he was reluctant to split it. Related Video How to invest in AI stocks The company has taken some steps to look into this strategy. Bloomberg reported in August that Intel had hired bankers to help consider several options, including splitting off the fabs from the rest of Intel. The company also announced in September that it would establish its Foundry business as a separate subsidiary within the company. Gelsinger's departure from the company, announced Monday, has reopened the question, although the calculus is more complicated than simple dollars and cents. Splitting the fabs from the rest of its business could help Intel improve its balance sheet. It likely won't be easy since Intel was awarded $7.9 billion in CHIPS and Science Act funding, and it's required to maintain majority control of its foundries. Advertisement Intel declined to comment for this story. A breakup could make Intel more competitive Politically, fabs are important to Intel's place in the American economy and allow the US to reduce dependence on foreign manufacturers. At the same time, they drag down the company's balance sheet. Intel's foundry , the line of business that manufactures chips, has posted losses for years. Fabs are immensely hard work. They're expensive to build and operate, and they require a level of precision beyond most other types of manufacturing. Advertisement Intel could benefit from a split, and the company maintains meaningful market share in its computing and traditional (not AI) data center businesses. Amid the broader CEO search, Intel also elevated executive Michelle Johnston Holthaus to CEO of Intel Products and the company's co-CEO. Analysts said this could better set up a split. Regardless, analysts said finding new leadership for the fabs will be challenging. "The choice for any new CEO would seem to center on what to do with the fabs," Bernstein analysts wrote in a note to investors after the announcement of Gelsinger's departure. Advertisement On one hand, the fabs are "deadweight" for Intel, the Bernstein analysts wrote. On the other hand, "scrapping them would also be fraught with difficulties around the product road map, outsourcing strategy, CHIPS Act and political navigation, etc. There don't seem to be any easy answers here, so whoever winds up filling the slot looks in for a tough ride," the analysts continued. Intel's competitors and contemporaries are avoiding the hassle of owning and operating a fab. The world's leading chip design firm, Nvidia, outsources all its manufacturing. Its runner-up, AMD, experienced similar woes when it owned fabs, eventually spinning them out in 2009. Intel has also outsourced some chip manufacturing to rival TSMC in recent years — which sends a negative signal to the market about its own fabs. Advertisement Intel is getting CHIPS Act funding Ownership of the fabs and CHIPS Act funding are highly intertwined. Intel must retain majority control of the foundry to continue receiving CHIPS Act funding and benefits, a November regulatory filing said. Related stories Intel could separate its foundry business while maintaining majority control, said Dan Newman, CEO of The Futurum Group. Still, the CHIPS Act remains key to Intel's future. "If you add it all up, it equates to roughly $40 billion in loans, tax exemptions, and grants — so quite significant," said Logan Purk, a senior research analyst at Edward Jones. Advertisement "Only a small slice of the commitment has come, though," he continued. Intel's fabs need more customers Intel is attempting to move beyond manufacturing its own chips to becoming a contract manufacturer. Amazon has already signed on as a customer. Though bringing in more manufacturing customers could mean more revenue, it first requires more investment. There's a more ephemeral reason Intel might want separation between its Foundry and its chip design businesses, too. Foundries regularly deal with many competing clients. Advertisement "One of the big concerns for the fabless designers is any sort of information leakage," Newman said. "The products department competes with many potential clients of the foundry. You want separation," he added. It was once rumored that a third party might buy Intel . Analysts have balked at the prospect for political and financial reasons, particularly since running the fabs is a major challenge.

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