Static Mesh Animation Best Practice

I have a static mesh (a chest) and I’m wondering about the best way to go about animating it is. Since this chest will be spread out multiple times in the level a matinee seems impractical.

So my question is what is the best or usual practice for hard surface static mesh animation? Should I animate it in 3ds Max and import the animation or should I use blueprints and work with Lerp Vector nodes to animate the asset? Any help would be great thanks.

Side Question: When is the right time to use matinee? Doors? single instances of animation? Thanks