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Exclusive: Here’s a really cool project that just got greenlit at DC Studios and Warner Bros Pictures Animation: Dynamic Duo.

It will mark the first joint project between DC Studios and the Bill Damaschke-led Wbpa.

The 6th & Idaho movie scripted by Matthew Aldrich is being made by a new animation studio out of New Orleans named Swaybox and that studio’s husband-and-wife creators Arthur Mintz and Theresa Andersson. Mintz will direct this movie, which follows the early days of Dick Grayson and Jason Todd aka the Robins.

Note the storyline here isn’t connected to Matt Reeves’ Batman and The Penguin canon.

Swaybox uses a technology known as “Momo animation,” which is a cross between CGI animation, practical elements of stop-motion, and live-action real-time performance. The result is long-form storytelling billed as visually breathtaking, dynamically expressive and more human.

DC Studios’ James Gunn and Peter Safran, Swaybox Studios...

Henry Selick, the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas, says that he has hidden Jack Skellington’s in every one of his films.

The filmmaker recently revealed that he has left Easter Eggs for fans in all of his movies.

“If you look very, very carefully, you might find that there’s some image of Jack in every other film I’ve made. But I can’t legally say that’s true, but it might be true,” Selick said in an interview with GamesRadar+.

The Coraline director pointed fans to a scene from the film, adding, “You might find something in the breakfast.” GamesRadar+ noted the scene from the 2009 film when The Other Mother cracks an egg into a bowl; the yolk has a familiar face.

Other examples include 1996’s James and the Giant Peach, in which the captain of a gang of skeletal pirates looks like Jack and is referred to as Skellington.

The official announcement at D23 of Pixar’s Andrew Stanton writing and directing “Toy Story 5” is a big deal. Stanton has co-written the previous four “Toy Story” films, receiving Oscar nominations for the original and the third film.

But now as a director, he finally gets to be in total control of the franchise he helped establish. So if there was going to be a fifth “Toy Story,” he’s the perfect director for a couple of reasons.

The first is that, since “Wall-e,” Stanton has been fascinated with science fiction and the dangers of ubiquitous technology. The story for the fifth “Toy Story” allows him to double down on that fascination.

“Let’s be real,” Stanton told the packed Honda Center in Anaheim on Friday night. “Toys have some serious competition these days with phones, tablets, and technology everywhere. So, this time around, it’s toys vs. tech.

Top 10 animated movies of all time ( Photo Credit – IMDb )

Let’s take a trip down memory lane as we explore a curated selection of the greatest animated films ever crafted. If your favorite isn’t included, don’t worry; there may be a follow-up if this piece strikes a chord with readers. Animated movies, particularly those tailored for young audiences, have traditionally been led by Disney and its offshoot Pixar. Despite their continuous reinvention of beloved tales, both studios have gifted us a wealth of timeless animated treasures. So, without delay, let’s begin our cinematic voyage through the enchanting world of animation.

10. Cars (2006)

Director: John Lasseter, Joe Ranft (co-director) Cast: Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Bonnie Hunt, Larry the Cable Guy Rotten Tomatoes Score: 75% IMDb Score: 7./10 Runtime: 1 hour 57 minutes Available on: Disney Plus (US & India)

On his journey to the most important race of his career, Lightning McQueen gets separated from his hauler truck,...

Pixar is working away on Toy Story 5 – although even Tim Allen wonders if five may be too many…

It was earlier in the year that Disney boss, Bob Iger, decided to offset some of the company’s problems by announcing a raft of sequels to the firm’s megahits. Those films? Frozen 3, Zootropolis 2 and – yep – Toy Story 5.

It was back in 2019 that the Toy Story saga appeared to have come to an end at Pixar, with the just-about-got-away-with-it Toy Story 4. Realistically, Toy Story 3 was the perfect ending to the trilogy, but the fourth film had enough in the tank, and certainly enough in the bank. Spin-off movie Lightyear fell to Earth in the summer of 2022.

When Iger announced Toy Story 5 though, there was some suspicion as to whether the lead voices – Tom Hanks and Tim Allen – would be persuaded to return to voice Woody and Buzz again.

Tim Burton is clear that a sequel or a reboot of The Nightmare Before Christmas is not happening. In a new interview, the director talks about what he thinks about the idea of the stop-motion film getting a follow-up 30 years after the movie’s debut.

“I’ve done sequels, I’ve done other things, I’ve done reboots, I’ve done all that shit, right? I don’t want that to happen to this. It’s nice that people are maybe interested [in another one], but I’m not,” Burton told Empire.

He continued, “I feel like that old guy who owns a little piece of property and won’t sell to the big power plant that wants to take my land.”

The publication notes that Burton then said in a “grumpy old prospector voice,” “Get off of my land! You pesky little… You ain’t getting this property! I don’t care...

“Barbie” is a box office smash, along with its acclaim from critics and audiences alike. If you follow the social media chatter and the general feeling from most pundits, it could be a viable awards contender for Warner Bros. One category being debated is where the screenplay by Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach would be able to compete — whether in original or adapted screenplay. The answer lies in how the WGA classifies it and whether the Academy could or would overrule that choice.

Variety confirms there are ongoing conversations with strategists and Warner Bros regarding where “Barbie” would compete at next year’s ceremony.

On the title cards, it reads “Based on ‘Barbie’ by Mattel,” which is, of course, a toy company. At the same time, there have been multiple CGI films and TV series featuring the fashion doll since its debut in the late 1980s (42 to be precise). This...

After one of the most impressive winning streaks in Hollywood history, Pixar has seen its fortunes reversed in recent years, with last year’s flop Lightyear and a pandemic-era policy of sending its features straight to streaming at Disney+. Now, Pixar faces a major test of brand strength as it prepares to unveil Elemental, its first original theatrical feature since Covid-19 hit.

Directed by Peter Sohn, the film is based on an original story set in a world where fire, water, earth and air residents live together. Among early reviews, the title has an underwhelming 64 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, a low number for Pixar. Additionally, the movie is tracking to soft numbers, just $37 million to $38 million over the June 16-18 opening weekend, which it shares with Warner Bros.’ The Flash. Only a handful of Disney’s releases have debuted to less than $50 million. (There were plenty of negative...

Pete Docter is no stranger to awards ceremonies.

He’s the only filmmaker to have won the Best Animated Feature Oscar three times (most recently for the 2020 film “Soul”) and Docter’s “Up” was only the second animated movie to be nominated for the Best Picture Oscar. Add to that a half-dozen Annie Awards and a BAFTA trophy.

This year, Docter will be honored with the Winsor McKay Award at this year’s Annies, presented by the Los Angeles branch of the International Animated Film Association, Asifa-Hollywood. Previous Winsor McKay honorees, named for the legendary animator behind Gertie the Dinosaur, include Eyvind Earle, Hayao Miyazaki, Ray Harryahusen, Tim Burton and Don Bluth. Docter will be honored alongside Canadian animator Evelyn Lambart (posthumously) and Craig McCracken, creator (most recently) of Netflix’s “Kid Cosmic.”

“That’s totally exciting. I had no idea. And then you look at the list of past...

Disney and Pixar have released a new trailer for “Lightyear,” the origin story of “Toy Story’s” beloved Buzz Lightyear.

The film introduces the “real-life” (or human) space ranger that inspired the toy line seen in the Pixar franchise. The animated sci-fi feature, which stars Chris Evans as the voice of Buzz, is set to come to theaters June 17.

“Animated movie[s] were an enormous part of my childhood. They were my escape. My adventures. My dreams,” Evans wrote in an October tweet following the release of a teaser for the film. “They were my first window into the magic of storytelling and performing… ‘Thank you’ doesn’t even come close.”

In the trailer, Buzz blasts off into space after being marooned on a remote planet. The test flight eventually lands him on alien worlds where he’s pursued by legions of robots and unknown creatures. He’s joined by fellow...

This Halloween, pop star Billie Eilish wore a patchwork dress and painted stitch scars to sing in front of a sold-out crowd at LA’s Banc of California stadium. The song wasn’t hers, but a Danny Elfman composition from the 1993 soundtrack to animated feature Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas. ‘Sally’s Song’ is a broken-hearted lament written for a broken character – a Frankensteinian stitched-together rag doll brought to life by an evil scientist in the town of Halloween.

In 2021, Sally really needs no introduction. From October to December each year, she and paramour Jack Skellington are everywhere, from trick or treating costumes to theme park rides to a mountain of ever-increasing Disney merchandise. Like the film that made them famous, they’re also not only a kid thing – just Google ‘Jack and Sally wedding cake’ for evidence. Those two have been #relationshipgoals for decades, their status as...

There have been a lot of fan theories revolving around what happened to Andy's dad in Pixar's Toy Story. Either Andy’s parents were divorced, or his dad died. Well, a version of the story behind Andy's dad has been revealed by Toy Story consultant Mike Mozart. He says that Andy's Dad died and the story behind his death is one of the saddest stories ever. Seriously, this story might just make you shed a tear.

Mozart helped his friend Joe Ranft, who was Pixar’s former head writer. Apparently, before Ranft passed away, he shared the story of Andy’s dad with Mozart, which he called Toy Story 0. You can watch him talk tell the story of Andy's dad in the video below, but I'll give you the basic rundown.

This is not an official story as it was debunked by Toy Story writer Andrew Stanton,...

The internet was abuzz with a video explaining the sad, sad backstory to “Toy Story” yesterday; unfortunately — or maybe not, given what a bummer it was — the video has been debunked by Pixar’s Andrew Stanton, who co-wrote all three movies in the series. “Complete and utter fake news,” he tweeted. “Everyone go back to your homes. Nothing to see here, folks. #Iwasthere”

Read More: Pixar’s Sequel Problem: Studio Tells Audiences Not to Worry About Franchises in Its Slate — Sf International Film Festival

Still, it’s a good story. According to Mike Mozart, who served as a toy consultant on the original film, Pixar’s former head writer Joe Ranft (now deceased) confided in him the tragic backstory of Andy’s dad. The long version can be found in the video below, but here’s the gist of it: Andy’s father, also named Andy, had polio as a child.

The Toy Story franchise is already more melancholy than the average kids’ film series, what with all the near-death experiences and broken-hearted, abandoned cowgirls. But even Pixar’s darker work rarely goes so dark as to cite polio, which is why fans of the films were kind of surprised when someone claiming to have intimate knowledge of their inner workings started saying that a bout of the crippling disease was ultimately the reason Woody and Buzz’s owner, Andy, was being raised by his single mother in the series’ first film.

io9 reported on the claims, which came from Mike Mozart, a toy designer and reviewer who’s said that he once consulted for his friend, late Pixar writer Joe Ranft, on the characters’ backstories. According to an appearance Mozart made on a recent episode of the web series Super Carlin Brothers, Andy’s dad (also named Andy) was Woody...

“Toy Story” fans have speculated for years about the story behind Andy’s absent father, and according to the film’s writer Andrew Stanton they’re going to have to keep on guessing. An interview with artist Mike Mozart went viral Saturday in which he claimed his friend, the late Pixar head writer Joe Ranft, had told him […]...

We're not crying. you're Crying. For years, fans have debated what happened to the father of human Toy Story character Andy, owner of Woody and the other toys he and the viewers love. Many have speculated that he is separated from Andy's mom or isn't alive. The latter theory appears to have been confirmed by artist and toy creator and reviewer Mike Mozart, who cited his late friend, Toy Story co-writer Joe Ranft. In a live stream, Mozart said Ranft consulted him for the first movie and told him, when asked, that Andy's dad "died before Toy Story 1 started.'" Disney has not confirmed his comments, which tell of a story that should...

If something is beloved enough by audiences, there’s no doubt that fans will almost immediately go to work picking it apart in every way imaginable. The internet is full of articles and videos chronicling dream-killing plot holes from all our favorite films, and Toy Story is no different. One plot hole that has persisted all these years has to do with Woody.

As was revealed in Toy Story 2, Woody was made decades ago. So why is it that this Woody is so attached to Andy? What ever happened to his previous owner(s), and why hadn’t Woody had the same tragic backstory as Jessie?

Believe it or not, there is a backstory behind this, but the only man who really knew about it was Joe Ranft, a Pixar writer who was pivotal in Pixar’s formative years. Sadly, Ranft passed away in a car crash some time ago,...

"Monsters University" director Dan Scanlon has come onboard to take the helm of a third movie in the "Cars" franchise at Disney and Pixar according to Pixar Planet.

The site noticed a recent official blog post which lists Scanlon as co-director on the film, but there's no other name listed. No formal announcement about Scanlon being on the project has been made by the studio.

Despite the critical drubbing and soft box-office of the first two films, the "Cars" franchise has been a massive success for Disney in terms of tie-in merchandising, the first film alone raking in $10 billion in merchandise sales in the first five years since its release.

John Lasseter and Joe Ranft helmed the first, Lasseter and Brad Lewis helmed the second. The third is currently targeting a June 16th 2017 release.

©2015 Disney•Pixar. All Rights Reserved.

Pixar Animation Studios was the big winner at the 43rd Annual Annie Awards, Saturday evening at UCLA’s Royce Hall. Inside Out won Best Animated Feature along with 11 other categories, including Outstanding Music – Michael Giacchino; Outstanding Editing – Kevin Nolting; Outstanding Production Design – Ralph Eggleston; Outstanding Voice Acting – Phyllis Smith as ‘Sadness’; Outstanding Writing – Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve and Josh Cooley; and Best Directing – Pete Docter.

Watch the 2016 Annie Awards here.

This year was the first for the new category Best Animated Feature, Independent with Filme de Papel’s ‘Boy and the World’ taking this top honor.

The Best Animated Special Production was awarded to ‘He Named Me Malala’ (Parkes-MacDonald/Little Door); Best Animated Short Subject ‘World of Tomorrow’ (Don Hertzfeldt); Best Animated TV/Broadcast Commercial ‘Man and Dog’ (Psyop); Best General Audience Animated TV/Broadcast Production for Preschool Children ‘Tumble Leaf’ – Mirror (Amazon Studios and...

The International Animated Film Society, Asifa-Hollywood, announced nominations today for its 43rd Annual Annie Awards recognizing the year’s best in the field of animation.

The Annie Awards cover 36 categories and include Best Animated Feature, Best Animated Feature-Independent (new this year), Special Productions, Commercials, Short Subjects, Student Films and Outstanding Individual Achievements, as well as the honorary Juried Awards.

This year’s Best Animated Feature nominations include: Anomalisa (Paramount Pictures), Inside Out (Pixar Animation Studios), Shaun the Sheep The Movie (Aardman Animations), The Good Dinosaur (Pixar Animation Studios), and The Peanuts Movie (Blue Sky Studios, Twentieth Century Fox Animation).

“This year we introduced an important new category – Best Feature-Independent,” says Asifa-Hollywood President, Jerry Beck. “We will now recognize not only features in wide release, but also the independent animators, international studios, anime and special productions that might not otherwise get the attention they deserve. Adds Frank Gladstone, Asifa-Hollywood’s Executive Director,...

Though it floated in the rumoursphere in the years since Toy Story 3 effectively appeared to wrap up the story of Woody, Buzz and the rest of the playroom pals (aside from their appearances in shorts and TV specials), a fourth Toy Story film was officially announced last November. With a 2017 release date on the books, John Lasseter has picked Pixar veteran Josh Cooley as his co-director. Cooley has been with the company since legendary story man Joe Ranft hired him as an intern on Cars. Since then, he’s worked his way up through films such as Ratatouille, Brave and Up to become head of story on the company’s forthcoming release, Inside Out. And he’s also earned his director’s stripes making shorts, including one set within the world of Pete Docter’s film, which will be on the Inside Out Blu-ray. “To be co-director on Toy Story 4 with John,...

Update: A couple of new details here. You might be wondering, since the original report doesn't mention any story details, how exactly this thing is going to play out. Sources tell HitFix that Condon won't only be drawing from the 1991 Disney film. In his pitch to the studio, the director said he would also include most, if not all, of the Menken/Rice songs from the Broadway musical that ran for 13 years from 1994 to 2007. It will be a "straight-forward, live action, large-budget movie musical," we're told. See below for the earlier story. Earlier: With "Maleficent" hitting big (though, contextually, not as big as the breathless media seems to think), and an "Alice in Wonderland" sequel on the way, it's clear Disney is interested in testing the stamina of the company's intellectual properties in the live action space. Add one more to the schedule: "Beauty and the Beast." Variety reports that...

Finding Nemo encompasses a tremendous amount of positive imagery that makes up Disney and Pixar’s populous appeal. From learning how to trust family and friends, to overcoming biggest fears and obstacles, Finding Nemo understands how to tap into the audience’s heartstrings and neatly ties in a meaningful message for the viewer to take home. Yet with every good side, there is a dark presence that even Disney can’t back away from. Like many Disney films, from Bambi to Frozen, Finding Nemo deals with a story whose basis stems from a broken household struggling with a great deal of separation. Why does Disney cling onto threads of such despair and heartache? Perhaps it’s a factor many can relate to. Or perhaps it’s a working formula that sweetens the arc of a happy ending. Either way, separation is a tapped fountain of which Hollywood has dipped into time after time again.

What makes a brilliant script? Is it quotable lines? Is it nuanced dialogue? Or is it just the ability to move the story along and not get in the way? When looking back through the history of screenwriting, there are plenty of iconic films based on previous work; the Writer’s Guild of America voted Casablanca the greatest screenplay of all time, but it’s adapted. So, what is the most important piece of film writing ever written directly for the screen? This list will shift from American to international, conventional to unconventional. Most importantly, these are the scripts that demonstrate how “screenwriting from scratch” is done.

courtesy of amazon.com

50. Last Year at Marienbad (1961)

Written by Alain Robbe-Grillet

Empty salons. Corridors. Salons. Doors. Doors. Salons. Empty chairs, deep armchairs, thick carpets. Heavy hangings. Stairs, steps. Steps, one after the other. Glass objects, objects still intact, empty glasses. A glass that falls,...

Odd List Simon Brew 15 Nov 2013 - 07:08

Lots of films are dedicated to, or in memory of someone. But it's not always clear why. We've been finding out...

Back when Breaking Bad returned for its final batch of episodes in August 2013, it had a dedication at the end of it. The card read 'Dedicated to our friend Kevin Cordasco'. As it turned out, Kevin Cordasco was a 16-year old who had been battling cancer for seven years, who had met both Bryan Cranston and Vince Gilligan. Cordasco died before he could ever get to see the episode dedicated to him.

I found this such a moving story, that it got me wondering about the dedications that appear on films, and what the story behind them was. After all, the dedications are there for a reason. What I uncovered was some funny stories, mainly extremely sad ones, and some extremely moving dedications.

Greetings from the apocalypse! That may be this column's reassuring greeting each week, but damn if it hasn't proved prescient as all get-out. It seems like we can't go a week this summer without at least one movie where extinction-level events occur with pornographic intensity ("Man of Steel," "This is the End," "After Earth," the upcoming "Pacific Rim" and "The World's End"). Not that I'm complaining. Bring on the rubble, Brad Pitt!

Friday, June 21

Pow! In Theaters

Brad Pitt, big-budget zombie movie. Those are two phrases you thought you'd never hear put together by anyone not on mescaline, but "World War Z" is upon us and we must act for the preservation of our species! Pitt plays an all-purpose Un investigator/ badass named Gerry Lane who is dispatched to find patient zero in a zombie plague scorching the Earth in an all-encompassing way. Will the human race survive? Will...

Sometime in 1994, shortly after completing production on Pixar’s first feature film, Toy Story, four of the new animation studio’s creative heads met for a brainstorming lunch that would soon become legend. In just a couple of hours, Toy Story director John Lasseter and his co-writers Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter and Joe Ranft came up with the concepts for four more Pixar movies: A Bug’s Life; Monsters, Inc; Finding Nemo and Wall-e.

Hard to believe it's been a full 10 years since Disney and Pixar released "Finding Nemo" (on May 30, 2003). That means that you and your kids (or you and your parents) have watched it on DVD approximately, oh, seven bazillion times. Even among Pixar's stellar slate of movies, the underwater adventure has been a standout, an instant classic, and one of the most popular animated features ever made.

Still, there may be a lot you don't know about "Nemo," like where the idea for the film came from, or how some of the stranger underwater sound effects were generated, or who some of the surprising cast members are (and aren't). Read on for these and other revelations from the deep.

1. Writer/director Andrew Stanton's inspirations for "Finding Nemo" were a childhood memory of a fish tank in a dentist's office and a visit to the Six Flags Marine World park with his five-year-old son.

Hard to believe it's been a full 10 years since Disney and Pixar released "Finding Nemo" (on May 30, 2003). That means that you and your kids (or you and your parents) have watched it on DVD approximately, oh, seven bazillion times. Even among Pixar's stellar slate of movies, the underwater adventure has been a standout, an instant classic, and one of the most popular animated features ever made. Still, there may be a lot you don't know about "Nemo," like where the idea for the film came from, or how some of the stranger underwater sound effects were generated, or who some of the surprising cast members are (and aren't). Read on for these and other revelations from the deep. 1. Writer/director Andrew Stanton's inspirations for "Finding Nemo" were a childhood memory of a fish tank in a dentist's office and a visit to the Six Flags Marine World park with his five-year-old son.

The Rescuers Down Under

Directed by Hendel Butoy and Mike Gabriel

Written by Jim Cox, Karey Kirkpatrick, Byron Simpson, Joe Ranft

Starring Bob Newhart, Eva Gabor, George C. Scott

The level of faith the Walt Disney Company places in its own products never ceases to be amazing if inexplicable. Each era at this massive corporation is so categorically different from what came before, well back into when Disney was still a struggling film studio desperately trying to pay the bills with its shorts or, at the time, a handful of massively ambitious feature-length animated films. Thus, the faith placed in the product has always shifted. However, the Mouse House’s modern era, beginning in 1984, when Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and the late Frank Wells began their tenure in various high-level positions, has been concurrently maddening and glorious to behold. Whether we like it or not, Disney fans are something of...

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“Finding Nemo,” which was released on Blu-ray and DVD combo pack on Dec. 4, 2012, also stars Albert Brooks, Willem Dafoe, Allison Janney, Alexander Gould, Brad Garrett, Austin Pendleton, Stephen Root, Vicki Lewis, Joe Ranft, Geoffrey Rush, Bob Peterson, Nicholas Bird and Andrew Stanton from Oscar-winning writer and director Andrew Stanton and director Lee Unkrich.

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On August 14th and 15th, I attended the Finding Nemo 3d Press Junket in San Francisco, CA. I believe Crush, one of the loveable sea turtles from the film, sums the whole trip up best with this memorable quote:

“Saw the whole thing, dude. First you were all like “whoa”, and we were like “whoa”, and you were like “whoa…” ”

Nemo, an adventurous young clownfish, is unexpectedly taken to a dentist’s office aquarium. It’s up to Marlin (Albert Brooks), his worrisome father, and Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), a friendly but forgetful Regal Blue Tang, to make the epic journey to bring Nemo home. Their adventure brings them face-to-face with vegetarian sharks, surfer dude turtles, hypnotic jellyfish, hungry seagulls, and more. Marlin discovers a bravery he never knew, but will he be able to find his son?

The first night of the trip we were taken to Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville,...

It appears The Brave Little Toaster will have to be exceedingly courageous once more, as a company called Waterman Entertainment has bought it and plans to turn it into a live-action / CG hybrid film for, you know, kids. Originally published in 1980 by Thomas M Disch, the source book finds a lamp, an electric blanket, a radio, a hoover and a toaster heading off on a quest to find their owner, who they refer to as The Master. We are reliably informed that he’s simply a man and not a rogue Timelord.The tome has a storied history with cinema, since John Lasseter was the first to propose turning it into a film as Disney’s first stab at computer animation. He worked with another future Pixar stalwart, Joe Ranft, on a script, but the project never went ahead and Lasseter had to leave it behind when he left Disney.

One of my favorite parts of going to see a movie are the trailers that play before them. Trailers can serve many purposes. Some are just quick cuts of footage, filled to the brim with money shots so the audience will want to rush out and see it as soon as possible. Some, however, can work as their own short films. I particularly love when a trailer doesn’t even use footage from the movie, instead it uses footage filmed just for the trailer.

There can be an art to making a trailer. Some filmmakers choose to make their own trailers so they can do what they want and don’t have to deal with the audience seeing something they don’t want them too. There is one director in particular who appears on this list quite a few times, but I’ll discuss him in more detail later. Trailers,...

There has been a lot of drama on the Disney lot this year and not all of it has been in front of the camera. The most obvious starting point was the failure of John Carter to live up to expectation and its massive budget. The studio ended up announcing an expected operating loss of approximately $200 million to its stockholders because of that film, followed shortly after by the sacking of studio chief Rich Ross. There was a lot of finger pointing going around about who was to blame for the demise of both John Carter and Ross. A good portion of which centered on Pixar wunderkind Andrew Stanton -- directing his first live action film from a script he co-wrote with fellow Pixar alum Mark Andrews -- and Ross predecessor Dick Cook and John Lasseter. The John Carter debacle was mitigated in early May when The Avengers, the first...

Check out the new poster for Finding Nemo. Disney.Pixar.s film dives back into theaters and homes this year in breathtaking Digital 3D.. The must-.sea,. must-own Oscar®-winning underwater adventure.featuring the unforgettable Marlin, his forgetful friend Dory and the lovable young Nemo.returns to the big screen in a spectacular 3D theatrical release beginning September 14, 2012, and then swims into living rooms for the first time ever in high-definition Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D and Digital platforms on December 4, 2012.

..Finding Nemo. was originally shot in 3D,. said John Lasseter, chief creative officer for Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios and the film.s executive producer. .At last, with today.s technological advances, this spectacular underwater world can be seen as it was intended.showcasing its eye-popping detail and breathtaking colors to both theatrical and in-home audiences and creating a truly immersive experience..

.Finding Nemo,. first released in theaters in 2003, earned...

Finding Nemo will have a theatrical release in 3D in September, and the film will arrive on Blu-ray for the first time in December. For more information about the release read the press release below. This is my least favorite Pixar movie, but it is still a Pixar movie.

Official Press Release:

Disney•Pixar’s “Finding Nemo” dives back into theaters and homes this year in breathtaking Digital 3D™. The must-“sea,” must-own Oscar®-winning underwater adventure—featuring the unforgettable Marlin, his forgetful friend Dory and the lovable young Nemo—returns to the big screen in a spectacular 3D theatrical release beginning September 14, 2012, and then swims into living rooms for the first time ever in high-definition Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D and Digital platforms on December 4, 2012.

“‘Finding Nemo’ was originally shot in 3D,” said John Lasseter, chief creative officer for Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios and the film’s executive producer.

Disney.Pixar.s .Finding Nemo. dives back into theaters and homes this year in breathtaking Digital 3D.. The must-.sea,. must-own Oscar®-winning underwater adventure.featuring the unforgettable Marlin, his forgetful friend Dory and the lovable young Nemo.returns to the big screen in a spectacular 3D theatrical release beginning September 14, 2012, and then swims into living rooms for the first time ever in high-definition Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D and Digital platforms on December 4, 2012.

..Finding Nemo. was originally shot in 3D,. said John Lasseter, chief creative officer for Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios and the film.s executive producer. .At last, with today.s technological advances, this spectacular underwater world can be seen as it was intended.showcasing its eye-popping detail and breathtaking colors to both theatrical and in-home audiences and creating atruly immersive experience..

.Finding Nemo,. first released in theaters in 2003, earned the Oscar® for Best Animated Feature Film and...

In 2010 it was announced that Henry Selick, the beloved director of “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” had left Laika Studios, the Portland, Oregon-based animation studio run by Nike co-founder and chairman Phil Knight. Knight had hired Selick back in 2002 to help transition the studio from Will Vinton Studios (home of the California Raisins, among others) into a 21st century powerhouse. Selick’s first animated feature, the gorgeous “Coraline,” was released in 2009, but just a year later Disney and Pixar came courting and Selick packed his bags. Things have been quiet for a little while but some details have started to emerge about his Pixar project, while Disney has signed him on to a highly coveted property.

First, the Pixar stuff – when Selick was hired by Pixar, many thought it would simply be the studio’s stop-motion animation division, housed on the same sprawling campus as Pixar proper. But Selick has control...

Fictional representations of Mars have been popular for over a century and with good reason. Apart from the beauty of the planet’s dramatic red colour, early scientific speculations that its surface conditions might be capable of supporting life have often inspired writers to take on either the possibility that Mars could be colonized by humans or would be incapable of sustaining human life – thus the idea that Martians would one day invade our planet. With the release of Andrew Stanton’s sweeping action-adventure John Carter (a film based on a classic novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs and set on Mars), I’ve decided to list a few films which also revolve around the mysterious and exotic planet that might be worthy of your time.

#1- Total Recall

Directed by Paul Verhoeven

The premise for Total Recall, a film based on a Philip K. Dick short story ( ‘We Can Remember...

The Brave Little Toaster

Directed by Jerry Rees

Written by Jerry Rees and Joe Ranft

Starring Deanna Oliver, Jon Lovitz, Thurl Ravenscroft

Originality is so rare these days that we latch onto anything that doesn’t smell of being laughably, obviously derivative. Of course, when I say “we,” I mean film buffs because there’s no denying that the latest Transformers film, the third film in a franchise of movies based on a line of toys that inspired a 1980s-era cartoon, is nowhere near original yet made an insane amount of money at the worldwide box office. So not everyone craves originality all of the time. But even the masses crave it enough that when a movie comes along that presents something unique, whether it’s a story, a character, or a new world, we salivate over it like a dog in front of a steak.

And so it is...

Ratatouille

Written and directed by Brad Bird

Genius is a blessing and a curse. Who doesn’t have that moment where they wished they knew the answer to a question, whether it’s to sound important, put someone else in their place, or just show off? But being a genius has one obvious pitfall: once you prove yourself to be smart, or witty, or creative, or profound, everyone expects that much of you, if not more, in the future. If you don’t pay off on the promise of your initial genius, people start to wonder. It may or may not be wrong of the consumer, of the audience, to measure artists not only by their current work, but to compare it to their past projects. But we all do it, even if we don’t want to. And in judging artists and their work, we’re all going in with certain expectations.

Toy Story 2 3D Blu-ray Combo Pack Walt Disney Entertainment 1999 & 2009/Rated G/Running Time 92 Mins List Price: $49.99 – Available November 1, 2011 Being that Pixar Studios has the luxury of animation, they can take apart a film project a rebuild it several times during the production process. Toy Story 2 almost went straight to video, but John Lasseter had the foresight to see the potential of this sequel to his colossal hit – the first film in the Pixar canon – taking the reins and rethinking the project. It's a good thing too, because the film not only went on to great success, but is considered to be one of the best sequels ever made. In the first film, cowboy Woody (Tom Hanks) and space-cop Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) fight for their owner Andy's attention until Woody saves Buzz from their sadistic neighbor, Sid. Toy Story 2 turns the tables, as Buzz must save...

Toy Story 3D Blu-Ray Combo Pack Walt Disney Home Entertainment 1995 & 2009/Rated G/Running Time 81 Mins List Price: $49.99 – Available November 1, 2011 Back during the Fall of 1995, I had absolutely no interest in seeing Toy Story. Disney had enjoyed tremendous success and a resurgence of quality film-making that began with the 1989 release of The Little Mermaid. Classic Disney quality films were back and the subsequent releases of Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King, secured their new foothold in the industry and at the box-office. Yet the studio was also in danger of becoming a cold corporate entity. For every Beauty and the Beast, their live action division was turning out crappy soulless films like The Three Musketeers or the Pauley Shore vehicle In The Army Now.As the first full length computer animated feature Toy Story had a cold, soulless look to it upon first glance. As impressive as CGI was,...

In case you missed it, for the month, we were Obsessed With Pixar, a site-wide take-over on our previous home Obsessed With Film that was designed to show our appreciation for the greatest animation studio in the history of film-making. But what makes Pixar so great? Is it just the films? Is it the characters? Is it the joyful and playful ethos behind the company? Or is it all of the above?

Well, follow the link to find out exactly why we love Pixar…

1. The characters: Woody and Buzz

The relationship that a lot of Pixar’s modern reputation was built on, the sometimes volatile dynamic between the “wimpy cowboy doll” and his Space Ranger best buddy is built on the solid foundation of exceptional character development and wonderful, appropriate voice work by Tom Hanks and Tim Allen.

2. The Alternative Posters

Not content with merely making incredibly beautiful primary materials,...

To celebrate the end of our Pixar take-over, it is with great pleasure, and a good deal of relief, that I can unveil The Top 50 Pixar Characters, based entirely on my own opinions. But hey, I’m probably the biggest Pixar nerd there is, and I’ll willingly take tests to prove it.

Sadly no place for Flick from A Bug’s Life – I just don’t think he’s all that great in comparison to the rest of the cast, and Woody Allen’s version of essentially the same character in Antz is by far the more superior, thanks to a more authentic neuroses. He would probably have come in at number 51 is that’s any consolation, though I think it probably isn’t…

Anyway, enjoy.

50. Jesse The Yodelling Cowgirl

She almost didn’t make it, on account of her badly grating voice (thanks to Joan Cusack), but Jesse...

Bizarrely, despite the overwhelming success of the first Toy Story it was never the initial intention of Disney and Pixar to have its sequel get a theatrical release. Instead Toy Story 2 was destined for home video, so a secondary team at Pixar were happily beavering away on a 60 minute Dtv film whilst the rest of the company got A Bug’s Life in gear.

Fortunately, pressure from stars Tom Hanks and Tim Allen, alongside Disney’s excitement over early concepts, got them to convince Pixar that the only place for this film was the big screen.

Though it wasn’t smooth sailing from there, when John Lasseter returned from promoting A Bug’s Life in Europe he, and other Pixar employees, weren’t convinced that the film was working and he suggested a complete overhaul. Disney didn’t think this would be possible with a release date already firmly...

John Lasseter (left) and Joe RanftYou probably don't know the name Joe Ranft. If you do, you're likely not as familiar with him as you are with John Lasseter, Disney/Pixar head honcho and director of Pixar's first three films as well as their latest, Cars 2, which hits theaters this weekend.

I'm sure other Pixar greats such as Andrew Stanton (Wall-e), Pete Doctor (Up), Lee Unkrich (Finding Nemo) and Brad Bird (Ratatouille) are also more familiar to you than Ranft. Even Steve Jobs, who bought Pixar from George Lucas back in 1986 and then kept the lights on when things looked bleak in the late eighties and early nineties is likely to perk your ears sooner. And as Jobs kept Pixar open for business, it was Lasseter's unflagging belief in the future of computer animation combined with his talent and drive that brought the studio to where it is today.

And How Young Sherlock Holmes Unexpectedly Paved The Way For Pixar

The story of how Pixar began is a fascinating one when you consider the creative risks that a young John Lasseter took that ultimately cost him his job at a company he would later (practically) run! This, somewhat Shakespearean tale, can be punctuated quite well by a series of films that all, in some way, lend themselves to the development of the Pixar we know and love…

1. The Fox and the Hound (1981)

In 1975 the California Institute of the Arts set up a new programme for animation, taught by three members of Disney’s ‘Nine Old Men’, whilst that is impressive in itself the students they taught in that inaugural year included John Lasseter, Brad Bird, John Musker, Henry Selick and Tim Burton with artists like Joe Ranft, Andrew Stanton and Pete Docter.

After graduating Musker, Bird, Selick and Burton...

In a world that is obsessed with preventing errors and perfection, perhaps it's ironic that despite 11 straight blockbuster movies, Pixar cofounder and President Ed Catmull describes Pixar's creative process as "going from suck to nonsuck."

That's because Catmull and Pixar's directors think it's better to fix problems than to prevent errors. "My strategy has always been: be wrong as fast as we can," says Andrew Stanton, Director of Finding Nemo and Wall-e, "Which basically means, we're gonna screw up, let's just admit that. Let's not be afraid of that." We can all work this way more often.

So, for instance, Pixar does not begin new movies with a script. Far from it. Film ideas begin on rough storyboards until they work through thousands of problems throughout the process in order to take films from suck to nonsuck.

People at Pixar describe storyboards as the "hand-drawn comic book version" of a movie,...