list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Robots on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/Robots/229621/default.aspx Title: Robots
Year: 2005
Director: Carlos Saldanha, Chris Wedge
Plot: For this follow-up to their mega-hit Ice Age, directors Carlos Saldanha and Chris Wedge team with the screenwriting duo behind Parenthood and City Slickers, Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel. Robots stars Ewan McGregor as the voice of Rodney Copperbottom, an idealistic robot who wants to convince his electronic brethren to come together and work toward making the world a better place. As the story unfolds, Rodney faces opposition from an evil corporation headed by Big Weld (Mel Brooks) and finds some unlikely allies in the form of a ragtag group of misfit robots called the Rusties and voiced by the likes of Drew Carey and Amanda Bynes. Stanley Tucci and Dianne Wiest provide the voices of Rodney's parents, and Halle Berry portrays his love interest, Cappy. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 58
Number of Lists: 31
Number of blog posts: 3
Number of discussion threads: 5
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:50:44 GMTRobots2005Carlos Saldanha, Chris WedgeFor this follow-up to their mega-hit <a href=/films/204397/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>Ice Age</a>, directors Carlos Saldanha and Chris Wedge team with the screenwriting duo behind <a href=/films/26108/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>Parenthood</a> and <a href=/films/6252/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>City Slickers</a>, <a href="/players/P____90983/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Lowell Ganz</a> and <a href="/players/P___100987/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Babaloo Mandel</a>. Robots stars <a href="/players/P___196980/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Ewan McGregor</a> as the voice of Rodney Copperbottom, an idealistic robot who wants to convince his electronic brethren to come together and work toward making the world a better place. As the story unfolds, Rodney faces opposition from an evil corporation headed by Big Weld (<a href="/players/P____83158/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Mel Brooks</a>) and finds some unlikely allies in the form of a ragtag group of misfit robots called the Rusties and voiced by the likes of <a href="/players/P___241668/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Drew Carey</a> and <a href="/players/P___303423/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Amanda Bynes</a>. <a href="/players/P____72023/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Stanley Tucci</a> and <a href="/players/P____76163/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Dianne Wiest</a> provide the voices of Rodney's parents, and <a href="/players/P_____5863/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Halle Berry</a> portrays his love interest, Cappy. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide58Tag Target (>10)31353http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/u36193rasl3.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Robots/229621/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/the_mow/archive/2009/4/29/41867.aspx Post By: The_MOW
Post To: The_MOW Blog
Post Date: 4/29/2009 10:50:44 AM
Body: "Robots" follows the "life" of an up-and-coming robotic being named "Rodney Copperbottom," (Ewan McGregor) who has aspirations of becoming an inventor who goes to the big city to follow his dreams. He meets up with a crazy robot (Robin Williams) who constantly needs repairs. Together, with help from a group of robots known as the "Rusties," they help "Big Weld" (Mel Brooks) whose business has been taken over by a robot who would rather make parts for profit than parts to help those in need (Greg Kinnear). The first thing you notice is the incredible computer animation. The bright coloring is simply amazing, and the way the characters are designed are fun and quite unique. The actors are all good in their performances, and a few disguise their voices well enough for you to not realize who provides the voice. The biggest problem is the script. To me, it seemed that they added the jokes after writing the story -- and didn't really care if the joke didn't make sense in the scene they put it in. The story was fairly weak, and didn't leave much room for character advancement. The advancement of the characters didn't even give any room for the relationships between the characters. In my opinion, every aspect of character development, including development of characters relationships with one another, helps make a movie good. Children may like the look of the movie, and will probably laugh at what I call pretty lame jokes. Adults, on the other hand, might not like this movie at all. So, if your a child, you could ask your parents to rent this -- but don't be surprised if this is not their first choice of a rental.
]]>Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:50:44 GMTThe_MOWThe_MOW Blog4/29/2009 10:50:44 AM"Robots" follows the "life" of an up-and-coming robotic being named "Rodney Copperbottom," (Ewan McGregor) who has aspirations of becoming an inventor who goes to the big city to follow his dreams. He meets up with a crazy robot (Robin Williams) who constantly needs repairs. Together, with help from a group of robots known as the "Rusties," they help "Big Weld" (Mel Brooks) whose business has been taken over by a robot who would rather make parts for profit than parts to help those in need (Greg Kinnear). The first thing you notice is the incredible computer animation. The bright coloring is simply amazing, and the way the characters are designed are fun and quite unique. The actors are all good in their performances, and a few disguise their voices well enough for you to not realize who provides the voice. The biggest problem is the script. To me, it seemed that they added the jokes after writing the story -- and didn't really care if the joke didn't make sense in the scene they put it in. The story was fairly weak, and didn't leave much room for character advancement. The advancement of the characters didn't even give any room for the relationships between the characters. In my opinion, every aspect of character development, including development of characters relationships with one another, helps make a movie good. Children may like the look of the movie, and will probably laugh at what I call pretty lame jokes. Adults, on the other hand, might not like this movie at all. So, if your a child, you could ask your parents to rent this -- but don't be surprised if this is not their first choice of a rental. http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/11/18/37417.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 11/18/2008 6:00:57 PM
Body: It’s no secret that I have a soft spot for all things science fiction-related, and when it involves robots of any kind (the odd exception being the actual movie Robots, which I avoided like the plague) then I’m in like Flynn. The more non-human looking the robot, the more I’ll love it. (Which is probably why Disney’s own The Black Hole has some of the coolest movie robots in it. V.I.N.C.E.N.T.? Maximillian? Great stuff. Where’s my Blu-ray, Disney?) One of the movies this past year that actually got me into the theaters more than once was Disney/Pixar’s WALL•E, which comes out on DVD today. They’ve added a ton of special features to the film, especially (of course) if you buy the three-disc special edition, which includes a digital copy of the movie that you can toss on your iPhone, laptop, digital watch, toaster oven, or shaving mirror. Despite the fact that director Andrew Stanton says WALL•E has “no environmental message” whatsoever, it’s a bit ironic that on the commentary track he starts out by explaining that in the development process they wondered what would happen if so much trash piled up that humans had to leave the earth in order to clean it up. Sounds environmental enough to me. Luckily, the fact that Stanton continues to insist there’s no underlying meaning, and that he never made the connection between WALL•E and Johnny 5 from Short Circuit hasn’t detracted from my enjoyment of the film. Pixar decided to revisit the WALL•E universe by creating a short film using new animation and some recycled footage. The idea was that it would be a nifty little special feature for the DVD, which it is, but it makes me yearn for a sequel to WALL•E — which is a sign of Disney’s marketing magic at work. The short film is BURN•E, and I got the chance to see a little early and to talk with the director of the short, Angus MacLean. The DVD also includes the short magician vs. rabbit film Presto, and these two shorts alone are worth the price you’ll pay for this robotic wonder. Check out our interview with MacLean below the jump. Is there any Pixar film that you would have loved to work on, but didn’t get the chance to? I would have loved t o have worked on the original Toy Story which is the only Pixar feature that I was not involved in. I also wish that I could have worked on some of those Listerine commercials. I noticed that BURN•E does a fist-pump when he cuts through the door. What gave you the idea to include that? That is a bit of an inside joke. Brad Bird’s pet peeve is the movie cliche’ where a character does that fist-pump an says “YESSSS!” I think that I put that joke in just to irritate him. I think there is an easter egg on the Rataouille DVD that explains this. So if you watch that before you see BURN•E, the short will be 34% funnier. So when will we get to see BURN•E in Lego like you did with WALL•E? I designed a Lego BURN•E as a crew gift as a thank you for the hard work. I ordered the pieces, made custom decals and instructions and hand packaged each of the sets. If there is interest, I will post a picture on Flickr soon. WALL•E stands for Waste Allocation Load Lifter, Earth class. What does BURN•E stand for? BURN•E stands for: Basic Utility Repair Nano Engineer. I have since heard from some people that it actually be BURN•A because the “E” in WALL•E stands for “Earth-Class” and the “A” would be the appropriate “Axiom-Class”. Now I could argue that maybe BURN•E was a robot on earth that then was installed on the Axiom, but A: I would be lying and B: What is the point? If that is the biggest problem you have with the film, then I have done my job. Now put yourself i my shoes- you have to name this robot. The name BURN•E is funny and breaks the continuity of the film or BURN•A which is more accurate to the feature and is not funny at all. Which would you choose? I thought so. I do love that geeks pick up on this and I am happy to be creating this controversy. I’d probably do the same thing were I not involved. How much of an animated film is software and how much is the result of an “artist’s” vision and his/her ability to bring that vision to life? What role does software play in the pricess? Is it a mere tool, like, say, video editing software, or does it allow animators to do things they could not do with ink and paper? WALL•E was mostly created by a computer robot we have here at Pixar called the EntertainmentBot 3000. Nah, the computer is just a big, dumb pencil. Why’d you decide to give BURN•E of all the characters in WALL•E his own short? A.M.: I thought he was a fun character to animate. After I had animated the shot with him in the feature I wanted to know what happened to him. I wanted to answer that question with this short. How hard was it to think of a name that sounded like a robot but was a pun for a human name (Bernie)? His name internally had been “Repair Bot” When I started the short, I envisioned him as being called WELD•R. About two days later Jim Reardon, the head of WALL•E Story handed me a drawing he had done of the word BURN•E burned into metal. After that there was no going back. Q: Is it harder to do an animated film with little dialogue? Does it put more pressure on the animation to do the talking? Because of this, was WALL•E harder character to create than some of your others? It’s not harder to animate, but it is way more work in the story board process. At what point during the development of WALL•E did you start planning the story of BURN•E? Did they construct any plot points in the feature to facilitate the short, or vice versa? I came up with and started boarding the short approximately 5 months before WALL•E was completed. However, no plot points were changed in the feature to make the short work. There were things that were changed in that one shot in WALL•E that featured BURN•E after it had been finished. The light spire that he welds was not originally in the shot. How did you go about choosing scenes from WALL•E that BURN•E could impact? Did you have to scrap any ideas that just wouldn’t fit with the existing story? I came up with as many places in the movie as I could think of to cut back to. We cut whatever wasn’t funny or slowed the pace down. Oddly enough the scene from the feature that sparked the original idea for BURN•E was cut from the feature. The scene is too complicated to explain. Maybe that’s why it never made it. Having been the directing animator on WALL•E, what did that involve? The Directing Animator’s job is to help the other animators keep their animation on model so that the acting and movement are consistent for each of the characters over the entire film. They work to be both a surrogate voice of the Director when he/she is available, and also offer acting and performance suggestions. Directing Animators also help to define the motion and character of the main characters in the film. The Directing Animator reports directly to the Supervising Animators. On WALL•E (as well as The Incredibles) I worked under the Supervision Animators Alan Barillaro and Steven Hunter. They interface more with the production staff about the direction and management of the WALL•E animation department. They also serve as both a surrogate voice of the Director and also offer acting and performance suggestions as well. Time permitting, Supervising Animators will also help to define the motion and character of the main characters in the film. How did you get selected to direct BURN•E? Now that you’ve done it, what would you do differently? I think it was opportunity met with preparation. Andrew liked the idea of the DVD short being about BURN•E. He encouraged me to storyboard the film. After the story was approved, Andrew asked if I would be interested. What do you think was the hardest thing to get right in the short? There was a lot of difficult shots to pull off in this film. From a technical perspective, the shot with WALL•E touching Saturn’s rings that transitions into the pebble meteor was the hardest to pull off. The Effects Supervisor, Bill Watral did a fabulous job stitching the shot from the film and a bunch of new elements that were on a literally planetary scale. On the performance side, the shot where SUPPLY•R drops the light on the ground was the trickiest to get right. There was something in the boards that was really funny that was extremely difficult to capture. BURN•E has a very “Pixar” feel to it as an animated short. What is it about repetitive failure (Lifted, One Man Band, and now BURN•E) that is so funny? Humor usually comes about when result doesn’t match the expectation. If everything in an characters’ life goes well it’s hard to relate to and probably not as funny. Where do you actually start on design with so many different kinds of robots? In the WALL•E universe most of the robots are designed and built around the idea of function first, character second. With the character of WALL•E we figured out his motion as a trash compactor first. After that had been firmly established we then worked on how to define his character based on the limitations of him being a trash compactor Are there any easter eggs we should watch out for? There are a few small nods here and there to various sci-fi properties. I won’t go through all of them, but I will mention that there is a graphic on the elevator inside the Axiom that reads “ELV 426″ indicating that this is elevator number four hundred and twenty-six. This is of course (pushing my glasses up on my nose) a reference to LV-426 the planet that is the setting of the movie Alien and Aliens. How hard was it to get the right type of emotion out of a robot? It is always our goal as animators to make our work clearly communicate the thought process of the characters to the audience. It was particularly challenging for us on BURN•E as well as WALL•E because of the limited nature of the designs and the lack of dialogue. Both characters limited designs are are appealing, but more work must be done in the story process to communicate his intentions. WIth BURN•E and with WALL•E, if the audience can’t tell what the character is thinking or what is going on, then they lose interest very quickly. Disney / Pixar’s WALL•E Special Edition includes a ton of special features, like the excellent The Pixar Story documentary, directed by Leslie Iwerks (it’s been on cable a lot recently), the two mentioned short films, deleted scenes, and a lot more stuff. If you pick up the Blu-ray edition (highly recommended) you’ll get arcade games, fly-throughs of the set, a geek track by some of the crazy kids at Pixar, and a kitchen sink. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Tue, 18 Nov 2008 23:00:57 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com11/18/2008 6:00:57 PM It’s no secret that I have a soft spot for all things science fiction-related, and when it involves robots of any kind (the odd exception being the actual movie Robots, which I avoided like the plague) then I’m in like Flynn. The more non-human looking the robot, the more I’ll love it. (Which is probably why Disney’s own The Black Hole has some of the coolest movie robots in it. V.I.N.C.E.N.T.? Maximillian? Great stuff. Where’s my Blu-ray, Disney?) One of the movies this past year that actually got me into the theaters more than once was Disney/Pixar’s WALL•E, which comes out on DVD today. They’ve added a ton of special features to the film, especially (of course) if you buy the three-disc special edition, which includes a digital copy of the movie that you can toss on your iPhone, laptop, digital watch, toaster oven, or shaving mirror. Despite the fact that director Andrew Stanton says WALL•E has “no environmental message” whatsoever, it’s a bit ironic that on the commentary track he starts out by explaining that in the development process they wondered what would happen if so much trash piled up that humans had to leave the earth in order to clean it up. Sounds environmental enough to me. Luckily, the fact that Stanton continues to insist there’s no underlying meaning, and that he never made the connection between WALL•E and Johnny 5 from Short Circuit hasn’t detracted from my enjoyment of the film. Pixar decided to revisit the WALL•E universe by creating a short film using new animation and some recycled footage. The idea was that it would be a nifty little special feature for the DVD, which it is, but it makes me yearn for a sequel to WALL•E — which is a sign of Disney’s marketing magic at work. The short film is BURN•E, and I got the chance to see a little early and to talk with the director of the short, Angus MacLean. The DVD also includes the short magician vs. rabbit film Presto, and these two shorts alone are worth the price you’ll pay for this robotic wonder. Check out our interview with MacLean below the jump. Is there any Pixar film that you would have loved to work on, but didn’t get the chance to? I would have loved t o have worked on the original Toy Story which is the only Pixar feature that I was not involved in. I also wish that I could have worked on some of those Listerine commercials. I noticed that BURN•E does a fist-pump when he cuts through the door. What gave you the idea to include that? That is a bit of an inside joke. Brad Bird’s pet peeve is the movie cliche’ where a character does that fist-pump an says “YESSSS!” I think that I put that joke in just to irritate him. I think there is an easter egg on the Rataouille DVD that explains this. So if you watch that before you see BURN•E, the short will be 34% funnier. So when will we get to see BURN•E in Lego like you did with WALL•E? I designed a Lego BURN•E as a crew gift as a thank you for the hard work. I ordered the pieces, made custom decals and instructions and hand packaged each of the sets. If there is interest, I will post a picture on Flickr soon. WALL•E stands for Waste Allocation Load Lifter, Earth class. What does BURN•E stand for? BURN•E stands for: Basic Utility Repair Nano Engineer. I have since heard from some people that it actually be BURN•A because the “E” in WALL•E stands for “Earth-Class” and the “A” would be the appropriate “Axiom-Class”. Now I could argue that maybe BURN•E was a robot on earth that then was installed on the Axiom, but A: I would be lying and B: What is the point? If that is the biggest problem you have with the film, then I have done my job. Now put yourself i my shoes- you have to name this robot. The name BURN•E is funny and breaks the continuity of the film or BURN•A which is more accurate to the feature and is not funny at all. Which would you choose? I thought so. I do love that geeks pick up on this and I am happy to be creating this controversy. I’d probably do the same thing were I not involved. How much of an animated film is software and how much is the result of an “artist’s” vision and his/her ability to bring that vision to life? What role does software play in the pricess? Is it a mere tool, like, say, video editing software, or does it allow animators to do things they could not do with ink and paper? WALL•E was mostly created by a computer robot we have here at Pixar called the EntertainmentBot 3000. Nah, the computer is just a big, dumb pencil. Why’d you decide to give BURN•E of all the characters in WALL•E his own short? A.M.: I thought he was a fun character to animate. After I had animated the shot with him in the feature I wanted to know what happened to him. I wanted to answer that question with this short. How hard was it to think of a name that sounded like a robot but was a pun for a human name (Bernie)? His name internally had been “Repair Bot” When I started the short, I envisioned him as being called WELD•R. About two days later Jim Reardon, the head of WALL•E Story handed me a drawing he had done of the word BURN•E burned into metal. After that there was no going back. Q: Is it harder to do an animated film with little dialogue? Does it put more pressure on the animation to do the talking? Because of this, was WALL•E harder character to create than some of your others? It’s not harder to animate, but it is way more work in the story board process. At what point during the development of WALL•E did you start planning the story of BURN•E? Did they construct any plot points in the feature to facilitate the short, or vice versa? I came up with and started boarding the short approximately 5 months before WALL•E was completed. However, no plot points were changed in the feature to make the short work. There were things that were changed in that one shot in WALL•E that featured BURN•E after it had been finished. The light spire that he welds was not originally in the shot. How did you go about choosing scenes from WALL•E that BURN•E could impact? Did you have to scrap any ideas that just wouldn’t fit with the existing story? I came up with as many places in the movie as I could think of to cut back to. We cut whatever wasn’t funny or slowed the pace down. Oddly enough the scene from the feature that sparked the original idea for BURN•E was cut from the feature. The scene is too complicated to explain. Maybe that’s why it never made it. Having been the directing animator on WALL•E, what did that involve? The Directing Animator’s job is to help the other animators keep their animation on model so that the acting and movement are consistent for each of the characters over the entire film. They work to be both a surrogate voice of the Director when he/she is available, and also offer acting and performance suggestions. Directing Animators also help to define the motion and character of the main characters in the film. The Directing Animator reports directly to the Supervising Animators. On WALL•E (as well as The Incredibles) I worked under the Supervision Animators Alan Barillaro and Steven Hunter. They interface more with the production staff about the direction and management of the WALL•E animation department. They also serve as both a surrogate voice of the Director and also offer acting and performance suggestions as well. Time permitting, Supervising Animators will also help to define the motion and character of the main characters in the film. How did you get selected to direct BURN•E? Now that you’ve done it, what would you do differently? I think it was opportunity met with preparation. Andrew liked the idea of the DVD short being about BURN•E. He encouraged me to storyboard the film. After the story was approved, Andrew asked if I would be interested. What do you think was the hardest thing to get right in the short? There was a lot of difficult shots to pull off in this film. From a technical perspective, the shot with WALL•E touching Saturn’s rings that transitions into the pebble meteor was the hardest to pull off. The Effects Supervisor, Bill Watral did a fabulous job stitching the shot from the film and a bunch of new elements that were on a literally planetary scale. On the performance side, the shot where SUPPLY•R drops the light on the ground was the trickiest to get right. There was something in the boards that was really funny that was extremely difficult to capture. BURN•E has a very “Pixar” feel to it as an animated short. What is it about repetitive failure (Lifted, One Man Band, and now BURN•E) that is so funny? Humor usually comes about when result doesn’t match the expectation. If everything in an characters’ life goes well it’s hard to relate to and probably not as funny. Where do you actually start on design with so many different kinds of robots? In the WALL•E universe most of the robots are designed and built around the idea of function first, character second. With the character of WALL•E we figured out his motion as a trash compactor first. After that had been firmly established we then worked on how to define his character based on the limitations of him being a trash compactor Are there any easter eggs we should watch out for? There are a few small nods here and there to various sci-fi properties. I won’t go through all of them, but I will mention that there is a graphic on the elevator inside the Axiom that reads “ELV 426″ indicating that this is elevator number four hundred and twenty-six. This is of course (pushing my glasses up on my nose) a reference to LV-426 the planet that is the setting of the movie Alien and Aliens. How hard was it to get the right type of emotion out of a robot? It is always our goal as animators to make our work clearly communicate the thought process of the characters to the audience. It was particularly challenging for us on BURN•E as well as WALL•E because of the limited nature of the designs and the lack of dialogue. Both characters limited designs are are appealing, but more work must be done in the story process to communicate his intentions. WIth BURN•E and with WALL•E, if the audience can’t tell what the character is thinking or what is going on, then they lose interest very quickly. Disney / Pixar’s WALL•E Special Edition includes a ton of special features, like the excellent The Pixar Story documentary, directed by Leslie Iwerks (it’s been on cable a lot recently), the two mentioned short films, deleted scenes, and a lot more stuff. If you pick up the Blu-ray edition (highly recommended) you’ll get arcade games, fly-throughs of the set, a geek track by some of the crazy kids at Pixar, and a kitchen sink. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/6/25/31666.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 6/25/2008 1:01:30 PM
Body: Until last year’s brilliantly directed Ratatouille, all of Pixar’s animated features could be summed up with one word (toys, bugs, monsters, fish, superheroes, cars). Then the more complex plot synopsis of “rat functions as a culinary Cyrano in a French restaurant’s kitchen” came along and ruined the studio’s tradition of simplistic scenarios. Fortunately, this year Pixar is back on track with Wall-E, a movie that can be summed up as being about, in a word, robots. But in their pipeline they’ve got a couple sequels (Cars 2, Toy Story 3) and a couple multi-word synopses (2009’s Up and 2011’s The Bear and the Bow are, at the least, each described with two words: old man and fairy tale, respectively. Only 2011’s Newt could have been pitched using a single word: newts. So, while Pixar seems like it currently has enough on their hands, I’d like to suggest a few more single-word pitches for animated films in order to get things back to basics: Birds - They’ve given us a movie featuring a variety of bugs and a movie featuring a variety of sea creatures, so the obvious next place to go is a movie featuring a variety of birds. And since Pixar has already made a short about birds (For the Birds), they already have a starting point to jump off from. Animals - I guess it’s a pretty general word, but Pixar really needs to give us their answer to either (or both) Madagascar or (and) Kung Fu Panda. Maybe since DreamWorks has taken care of the African animals and the Asian animals, Pixar can go with the most interesting animal continent: Australia. Penguins - Yes, they’re birds and they’re animals, but this pitch needs to be separate. Though we’ve already seen Sony’s Surf’s Up and Warner Bros.’ Happy Feet, this still needs to be done, just so Pixar can win an Oscar with it and make up for losing to Happy Feet last year. Dinosaurs - Another one to make up, this time for Disney’s bomb from 2000, Dinosaur. Also, because every non-Pixar movie needs a Pixar equivalent (Antz vs. A Bugs Life; Shrek vs. Monsters, Inc.; Shark Tale vs. Finding Nemo; Robots vs. Wall-E; etc.) and we haven’t yet seen Pixar do a prehistoric pic in response to Fox’s Ice Age franchise. Bees - If DreamWorks can do both Antz and Bee Movie, then Pixar needs another kind of bug movie, too, preferably one with flying insects. Preferably to make us forget Jerry Seinfeld’s obnoxious promotions, also. Band - I think what Brad Bird did for superhero movies (it was both the best of its kind and the best spoof of its kind) should be done for rock bands. Plus, isn’t it about time Pixar made a real musical animated feature? Fruit - Pixar’s answer to VeggieTales, or simply it’s contribution to the long tradition of animated talking foods, from the vegetable cart on Pinwheel to the singing burger in Better Off Dead. Supermarket - If fruit is too specific, here’s a more general idea: anthropomorphic grocery items, from the produce aisle to the whatever is on the opposite side of the store aisle (in my local market it’s meats). This would be a great opportunity for more product suggestion (a la Apple Computers in Wall-E and Trix cereal in Presto), or even pure, blatant product placement. Furniture - A little bit Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, a lot bit Brave Little Toaster. Basically, Pixar needs to give Luxo Jr. a feature already. Disney - Since Pixar is owned by the Walt Disney Company, and since our old friends Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto haven’t had a good movie in a long, long time, I think it only makes sense that John Lasseter should produce a computer-animated movie featuring the classic Disney gang. Past attempts to make CG versions of the characters have been disappointing, but if anyone can make it work, Lasseter can. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Wed, 25 Jun 2008 17:01:30 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com6/25/2008 1:01:30 PM Until last year’s brilliantly directed Ratatouille, all of Pixar’s animated features could be summed up with one word (toys, bugs, monsters, fish, superheroes, cars). Then the more complex plot synopsis of “rat functions as a culinary Cyrano in a French restaurant’s kitchen” came along and ruined the studio’s tradition of simplistic scenarios. Fortunately, this year Pixar is back on track with Wall-E, a movie that can be summed up as being about, in a word, robots. But in their pipeline they’ve got a couple sequels (Cars 2, Toy Story 3) and a couple multi-word synopses (2009’s Up and 2011’s The Bear and the Bow are, at the least, each described with two words: old man and fairy tale, respectively. Only 2011’s Newt could have been pitched using a single word: newts. So, while Pixar seems like it currently has enough on their hands, I’d like to suggest a few more single-word pitches for animated films in order to get things back to basics: Birds - They’ve given us a movie featuring a variety of bugs and a movie featuring a variety of sea creatures, so the obvious next place to go is a movie featuring a variety of birds. And since Pixar has already made a short about birds (For the Birds), they already have a starting point to jump off from. Animals - I guess it’s a pretty general word, but Pixar really needs to give us their answer to either (or both) Madagascar or (and) Kung Fu Panda. Maybe since DreamWorks has taken care of the African animals and the Asian animals, Pixar can go with the most interesting animal continent: Australia. Penguins - Yes, they’re birds and they’re animals, but this pitch needs to be separate. Though we’ve already seen Sony’s Surf’s Up and Warner Bros.’ Happy Feet, this still needs to be done, just so Pixar can win an Oscar with it and make up for losing to Happy Feet last year. Dinosaurs - Another one to make up, this time for Disney’s bomb from 2000, Dinosaur. Also, because every non-Pixar movie needs a Pixar equivalent (Antz vs. A Bugs Life; Shrek vs. Monsters, Inc.; Shark Tale vs. Finding Nemo; Robots vs. Wall-E; etc.) and we haven’t yet seen Pixar do a prehistoric pic in response to Fox’s Ice Age franchise. Bees - If DreamWorks can do both Antz and Bee Movie, then Pixar needs another kind of bug movie, too, preferably one with flying insects. Preferably to make us forget Jerry Seinfeld’s obnoxious promotions, also. Band - I think what Brad Bird did for superhero movies (it was both the best of its kind and the best spoof of its kind) should be done for rock bands. Plus, isn’t it about time Pixar made a real musical animated feature? Fruit - Pixar’s answer to VeggieTales, or simply it’s contribution to the long tradition of animated talking foods, from the vegetable cart on Pinwheel to the singing burger in Better Off Dead. Supermarket - If fruit is too specific, here’s a more general idea: anthropomorphic grocery items, from the produce aisle to the whatever is on the opposite side of the store aisle (in my local market it’s meats). This would be a great opportunity for more product suggestion (a la Apple Computers in Wall-E and Trix cereal in Presto), or even pure, blatant product placement. Furniture - A little bit Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, a lot bit Brave Little Toaster. Basically, Pixar needs to give Luxo Jr. a feature already. Disney - Since Pixar is owned by the Walt Disney Company, and since our old friends Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto haven’t had a good movie in a long, long time, I think it only makes sense that John Lasseter should produce a computer-animated movie featuring the classic Disney gang. Past attempts to make CG versions of the characters have been disappointing, but if anyone can make it work, Lasseter can. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/groups/Movies_with_the_Kids/Re_Something_besides_Disney_PLEASE/246/29902/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: leeroy711
Post To: Movies with the Kids
Post Date: 5/25/2008 5:33:48 PM
Body: [quote user="SarahT"] [quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] Thanks leeroy711, we do own Robots and really like that one. We haven't seen the ice-age movies yet and will have to check them out. Appreciate the recommendations. [/quote] I've got a 4, 7, and an 8 year old. You also can't go wrong with muppets. Muppet Treasure Island (1996)
]]>Sun, 25 May 2008 21:33:48 GMTleeroy711Movies with the Kids5/25/2008 5:33:48 PM[quote user="SarahT"] [quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] Thanks leeroy711, we do own Robots and really like that one. We haven't seen the ice-age movies yet and will have to check them out. Appreciate the recommendations. [/quote] I've got a 4, 7, and an 8 year old. You also can't go wrong with muppets. Muppet Treasure Island (1996) http://www.spout.com/groups/Movies_with_the_Kids/Re_Something_besides_Disney_PLEASE/246/29894/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: SarahT
Post To: Movies with the Kids
Post Date: 5/25/2008 9:37:09 AM
Body: [quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] Thanks leeroy711, we do own Robots and really like that one. We haven't seen the ice-age movies yet and will have to check them out. Appreciate the recommendations.
]]>Sun, 25 May 2008 13:37:09 GMTSarahTMovies with the Kids5/25/2008 9:37:09 AM[quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] Thanks leeroy711, we do own Robots and really like that one. We haven't seen the ice-age movies yet and will have to check them out. Appreciate the recommendations. http://www.spout.com/groups/Movies_with_the_Kids/Re_Something_besides_Disney_PLEASE/246/29853/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: lopezdash
Post To: Movies with the Kids
Post Date: 5/23/2008 4:15:51 PM
Body: [quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] I was in my late teens when Robots came out (don't want to age myself too much here!), and I thoroughly enjoyed it!
]]>Fri, 23 May 2008 20:15:51 GMTlopezdashMovies with the Kids5/23/2008 4:15:51 PM[quote user="leeroy711"] I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 [/quote] I was in my late teens when Robots came out (don't want to age myself too much here!), and I thoroughly enjoyed it! http://www.spout.com/groups/Movies_with_the_Kids/Re_Something_besides_Disney_PLEASE/246/29835/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: leeroy711
Post To: Movies with the Kids
Post Date: 5/23/2008 2:05:57 PM
Body: I actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2
]]>Fri, 23 May 2008 18:05:57 GMTleeroy711Movies with the Kids5/23/2008 2:05:57 PMI actually really liked the Fox Animation Studios stuff, much more than Disnet/Pixar and Dreamworks: Robots, Ice Age and Ice Age 2 http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/comedy/MemberTagFilms.aspxcomedy
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