In case you didn’t know, a live-action Speed Racer movie is currently in production. The movie is being directed by the Wachowski brothers and will be released on May 8, 2008.
Check out the rest of the images at USAtoday.
Category: Films (Page 80 of 85)
Ratatouille just keeps on going. Today, the National Board of Review awarded Pixar’s latest film the Best Animated Feature award, which Pixar has previously won for Finding Nemo, Cards and The Incredibles. Previous winners also include Corpse Bride, Spirited Away, Shrek and Chicken Run.
Congratulations to all the people at Pixar who worked very hard on this film.
Via NBRMP
While speaking at a conference in New York City, THQ CEO Brian Farrell stated that THQ doesn’t have the rights to develop a videogame based on Toy Story 3, scheduled for theatrical release in 2010.
THQ’s current licensing deal gives them the rights to develop games based upon four Pixar films. Ratatouille, released this year, was the first film covered under the current agreement. Wall-E, coming to theaters in 2008, will be the second. The deal will also cover 2009’s UP and the unannounced, most likely John Carter of Mars, in 2011.
Disney has decided to develop the videogames internally. Smart move considering how big of a cash cow the Toy Story franchise is.
The nominees for the 35th Annie Awards have been revealed. Winners will be announced on Friday, February 8, 2008 at UCLA’s Royce Hall, in Los Angeles, CA.
Pixar Animation Studios’ Ratatouille leads this year with 13 nominations including Best Animated Feature as well as individual nominations for directing, writing, character animation, animated effects (two nominations), production design, storyboarding, character design, character animation, music and voice acting (three nominations).
Sony Pictures Animation’s Surf’s Up follows with 10 feature nominations for feature, animated effects, animation production artists, character animation (two nominations), character design, and directing.
Rounding out the Best Animated Feature category are DreamWorks Animation’s Bee Movie, Sony Pictures Classics’ Persepolis, and Twentieth Century Fox’s The Simpsons Movie.
For television, Nickelodeon’s El Tigre leads the pack with four nominations for Best Animated Television Production for Children, and individual nominations for character animation, character design, and music.
The Best Animated Television Production nominees this year are Creative Comforts America from Aardman Animations, Jane and the Dragon from Weta Productions Limited & Nelvana Limited, Kim Possible from Walt Disney Television Animation, as well as Moral Orel and Robot Chicken Star Wars from ShadowMachine.
Robert Zemeckis revealed that Colin Firth, Gary Oldman and Robin Wright Penn will be joining Bob Hoskins and Jim Carrey, in Zemeckis’ upcoming performance capture film, A Christmas Carol, which will be the first film released in the distribution deal between Zemeckis’ ImageMovers Digital and Walt Disney Pictures. Disney is hoping for a Nov. 6, 2009 release.
In 2008, Disney will launch an online game site based on the Disney/Pixar film “Cars,†Disney President and CEO Robert Iger said Nov. 29.
Disney is going to invest substantially in these types of sites over the next few years because of their potential in growing and maintaining interest in Disney film franchises. Instead of letting film franchises die, they can continue to live online, gaining new fans.
“You can live with and act with Lightning McQueen for years to come,†Iger added.
Via SF Valley Business Journal
You obviously know that I agree with that fact, but it isn’t as easy as you would think to get the nomination. While Pixar pretty much has the animation Oscar in the bag already, it isn’t the case with Best Picture. If they choose to attempt to get the nomination for Best Picture then they might lose votes in the Animation category. The NYTimes has a very detailed article on the situation.
I for one think Ratatouille not only deserves the nomination, but also the win. It is, after all, the best reviewed movie of the year.
So what do you think? Leave a comment!
Disney has announced that he new 2D Goofy short from Walt Disney Animation Studios, How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, will make its theatrical debut with National Treasure: Book of Secrets on Dec. 21.
This move shows how passionately Disney views its new animated shorts program under the leadership of Pixar’s John Lassseter and Ed Catmull. The short is inspired by the classic HOW TO Goofy shorts of the ‘40s and ‘50s directed by Jack Kinney and animated by John Sibley.
Via AWN
The performance-capture animated Beowulf debuted at number one this weekend with $28.1 million. 40 percent of that amount came from special 3-D showings in regular theaters and on Imax screens.
The film earned $8 million on 638 screens equipped with RealD technology, which uses a special reflective screen and polarized lens glasses that moviegoers can take as a souvenir. $3.6 million was earned on 84 Imax screens showing the film using their own 3-D technology.
In the number two spot was DreamWorks Animation’s Bee Movie with $14.3 million.
Via Yahoo!
Pixar has released a new poster for their upcoming film WALL-E which is set to hit theaters on June 27, 2008. Check it out below:
Walt Disney has signed director Tim Burton to a two-picture deal to make Alice in Wonderland and Frankenweenie.
Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland will be a performance-capture, live-action adaptation written by Linda Woolverton who also wrote The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast. The film will start production early next year so don’t expect to see it until late 2009 at the earliest.
Following Alice in Wonderland, Tim Burton will direct and produce a feature version of his 1984 short Frankenweenie. The stop-motion feature follows a dog that is brought back from the dead by its devoted owner.
UPDATE: Johnny Depp has signed on as the Mad Hatter.
Via AWN
IMAX and DreamWorks Animation announced a deal to release the studio’s first three 3-D motion pictures worldwide in IMAX 3-D. The IMAX 3-D releases will include Monsters vs. Aliens in March 2009, How to Train Your Dragon in November 2009 and Shrek Goes Fourth in May 2010. A fourth DreamWorks Animation title, Kung Fu Panda, will be released in IMAX’s 2-D format in June 2008.
The IMAX 3-D titles are expected to be among the first presented with IMAX’s digital 3-D projection system, which is scheduled to be launched beginning June 2008. This is IMAX’s first multiple 3-D picture deal with a Hollywood studio. The 3-D titles also will be simultaneously released to conventional digital 3-D theaters.
Via AWN
Just as I predicted last week, DreamWorks Animation’s Bee Movie has taken the number one spot away from “American Gangster”, which dropped to the number two spot.
This weekend’s top 10 movies were:
1 Bee Movie with $26,000,000 bringing it total so far to $72,214,000
2 American Gangster
3 Fred Claus
4 Lions for Lambs
5 Dan in Real Life
6 Saw IV
7 The Game Plan
8 P2
9 30 Days of Night
10 Martian Child
Twelve features have been submitted for consideration in the Animated Feature Film category for the 80th Academy Awards, including Ratatouille, The Simpsons Movie and Shrek the Third.
The other nine submissions are: Alvin and the Chipmunks, Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie, Bee Movie, Beowulf, Meet the Robinsons, Surf’s Up, Tekkonkinkreet, TMNT, and Persepolis.
The 80th Academy Awards nominations will be announced on Jan. 22, 2008, at 5:30 am PT in the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater.
Via AWN
Several years ago Jeff Lew was the Lead Animator of Matrix Reloaded. It was a great job, but it wasn’t his dream job. He wanted to make his own feature film. So he quit his job to pursue his dream.
For the past 4 years, he’s been working at his computer 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. He’s spent his entire life savings and maxed out credit cards. After all this time and effort, his movie is almost done. Below you can find a trailer for his feature film directorial debut… Killer Bean Forever.