Tuesday, March 02, 2010

Da Hat

Afternoon at the fabled Walt Disney Animation Studio, where ....

* Story work is in its final lap for Winnie the Pooh.

* The first-floor crew for Rapunzel Tangled is being lifted up by the rising currents of production work that is only now starting to waft through the department. (""We're going to be spending a lot of time here to get the move out in time.")

* A story person related: "The main lot decided now was not the right time for another Princess movie, which is what they considered Snow Queen to be. That's why it was put aside. John Lasseter hopes at some point it can still get made ..." [But that's why they changed Rapunzel's name, yes? To get away from the curse of "girl" movies? You know, like Beauty and the Beast and Little Mermaid?*)

And nobody I talked to knows how many hand-drawn projects (if any) will be happening after Winnie the Pooh wraps up the end of the year.

"There's several people working on projects to pitch, but so far nothing's been greenlit. Chris Buck is working on another feature idea [after Snow Queen], but that's going to be CGI ..."

And so it goes.

(* Personally, I think that the right title is super important. I only went to see "Finding Nemo" because I thought it was a sequel to "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea".)

25 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are aware its been officially announced its not called Rapunzel anymore right?

Anonymous said...

I HATE that Tangled title! I for one will call it by no other name. Just to show my hatred for the new title, I'm going to call it "Rapunzel" right up to the end, including the day I buy the box office tickets.

Anonymous said...

Maybe he just let the cat out of the bag that they're changing it back!


A man can dream, can't he?

J said...

"Anonymous # 2"

Let us know how that works out for you.

Anonymous said...

Tangled eh? Well, if the film don't sell, the hair products probably will.

Anonymous said...

What about Pinocchio changed into " Wood lies" or 101 dalmatians " White dogs with black spots" and Winnie the Pooh "The tiger and the bear"

Anonymous said...

but.... in your previous post about Disney, Pixie Arrhh wrote -

"Iger had nothing to do with axing Snow Queen. The story wasn't working, it wasn't coming together and Lasseter wasn't going to make it simply to make it."

Please, if you don't know the truth - just don't say anything at all.

Anonymous said...

Tangled. sucks.

And the tone of the trailer that got leaked SUCKS. Whats with the Pink song? Seriously?

What a bunch of mouth breathing idiots. Sad thing is, if the movie is successful despite the piss-poor marketing decisions, it will only encourage the dumbasses who made them. If the movie does poorly, they will blame fairy tales as a convenient straw man whipping boy.

What a predicament.

Anonymous said...

Yes, Snow Queen got canned. Good thing. I'm sick of Fairy Tales for now. Disney should be developing new, original, progressive films that look FORWARD instead of BACKWARDS. As a matter of fact, they shouldn't look at any previous film or artwork of theirs EVER AGAIN--it's wonderful stuff, but jesus-h-christ, let's move FORWARD.

Anonymous said...

You are aware its been officially announced its not called Rapunzel anymore right?

Um, well, no I wasn't:
The first teaser that's surfaced on the web conveniently avoids showing any final title (to tease us, you see), as well as conveniently avoiding any onscreen depiction of the female protagonist as being a pri-(shh!)

Which suggests that either the teaser was being cut in mid-change, or they're leaving the issue open to see which direction the tide of public/in-house reaction takes up till the last minute.
The fanboys have been rumbling about taking the Title issue all the way to petition--the serious kind this time, with real letters!--and it may not have been a good moment for the studio to go public taking sides one way or the other.

Anonymous said...

Oh, my - heavens to betsy. Disney fanboys starting petitions. What awesome power they wield. I'm sure everything will be righted now.

Anonymous said...

I like how Lasseter gave us hope that The Snow Queen film will be produced someday.

And as for the petitions for the name change, I believe they won't change everything. I mean if they protested or something may be but an online petition are a dime a dozen.

And please guys stop bashing Disney fans they have a right to speak out against a title of a film if they want to. Remember when the studio announced Aladdin's title.

Disney tried originality but that's not where the money is. If you look at past box office performane's of Disney's original films. They didn't do all that well, Disney should stick to adapting fairy-tales, books, myths, etc.

P.S.
Finished by proposed The Snow Queen cast, lol.

Gerda - Anne Hathaway
Kay - James Roday
The Snow Queen - Glenn Close
The Troll/The Devil - Ian McKellen
The Raven - Jim Cummings
The Robber Girl - Anneliese Van Der Pol
The King - Tony Jay
The Princess - Idina Menzel
The Prince - Robert Amel
Grandmother - Angela Lansbury

Anonymous said...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0398286/

ally said...

I hate Tangled... Rapunzel is better, Tangled sounds like a stupid parody like Shrek.

I really hope Disney will create an animated movie based on Snow Queen, bu a dark, frozen, epic story with a lot of heart.

Anonymous said...

"Gerda - Anne Hathaway
Kay - James Roday
The Snow Queen - Glenn Close
The Troll/The Devil - Ian McKellen
The Raven - Jim Cummings
The Robber Girl - Anneliese Van Der Pol
The King - Tony Jay
The Princess - Idina Menzel
The Prince - Robert Amel
Grandmother - Angela Lansbury"

Nice cast list, may I add this character to it.

The Sorceress - Angelica Huston

Aurora Dawson said...

"Gerda - Anne Hathaway
Kay - James Roday
The Snow Queen - Glenn Close
The Troll/The Devil - Ian McKellen
The Raven - Jim Cummings
The Robber Girl - Anneliese Van Der Pol
The King - Tony Jay
The Princess - Idina Menzel
The Prince - Robert Amel
Grandmother - Angela Lansbury"

Nice cast list, may I add this character to it.

The Sorceress - Angelica Huston"

Oh, I love Angelica Huston. Just one question, who the heck is Robert Amel?

Anonymous said...

Isn't he the guy from True Jackson, VP on Nickelodeon?

http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbie_Amel

Anonymous said...

Sorry forget the other l:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbie_Amell

Anonymous said...

You just burned through your budget on casting alone ;)

Art Fern said...

Sno-Cone- Belinda Schlump
Gerko- Marlon Branflakes
The Cheesemeister- Doodles Thropmorton
Spandex- Joe De Rita
King Dingaling- Frank Stallone
And introducing Knuckles, the 3 Legged Mystery Dog.

Anonymous said...

"You just burned through your budget on casting alone ;)"

Yeah, you're right, lol. May be get rid of Close, McKellen, Jay, Huston, Lansbury, Amell, and Huston. Way too many big star names.

What do you recommend?

P.S.
Just wanted Disney to have a big star cast so that the movie could get more attention. Possibly make The Snow Queen OSCAR GOLD! (Hint, hint, American Dad fans.)

Anonymous said...

And as for the petitions for the name change, I believe they won't change everything. I mean if they protested or something may be but an online petition are a dime a dozen.

I remember back ten years ago--back when Disney was going to give up on distributing Studio Ghibli films after one bad experience--the Anime fanboys organized themselves into a real "grownup" petition, sanctioning it with Disney reps and handling it through printed snail-mail copy.
When done the right way, it appeared to have worked...And since there's a lot of overlap between the Anime fan-faction and the Animation fan-faction, they've clearly been exchanging notes, and it's made them hungry to repeat their success again.

(And with the whole "Frog-phobia" issue being perceived as the reason for the title change, have to admit, I can see how they might be seeing a few suspicious historical parallels.)

Anonymous said...

"(And with the whole "Frog-phobia" issue being perceived as the reason for the title change, have to admit, I can see how they might be seeing a few suspicious historical parallels.)"

Well, we all have to remember, history does repeat itself.

Anonymous said...

MAKE THE SNOW QUEEN!!! It's kinda obvious that Disney has nothing really planned after the Winnie the Pooh sequel. So just make THE SNOW QUEEN. Something stinks around here and it's not John Lasseter's ugly Toy Story Hawaiian shirts.

Anonymous said...

well. it is for the kids these movies, right.

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