are ya sick of Pixar copycats yet? (CG movies)
 

ever since Pixar has been breaking box office records left and right with their various titles Fox and Dreamworks have both tried to come out with alternatives. for every A Bug's Life and Finding Nemo there is an Antz and Shark's Tale. what you'll notice is that the quality of the content is far far inferior. Fox's Ice Age and the upcoming Robots is another copycat. though Shrek&Shrek2 was entertaining i still think they aren't as 'classic' as monster inc. no matter what the competition tries to do Pixar's stories seem to be much better in quality. an easy example is The Incredibles coming out in Nov. we already know it is awesome because the director is the guy behind Iron Giant. i think the Pixar CG movies are better because they are able to anthropormophize inanimate objects with a heart.


whadya think?

I just like them, because it isn't a crappy rehashing of something as old as me! The stories are better than a lot of the Hollywood drivel, and the imagry is nice in most cases. Of course... I feel the same way about some of the Japanese animation too.

My 4 and a half year old son loves them and thats about what matters to me. I dont take these films too seriously in terms of 'cinematic masterpieces'. To me, their just glorified cartoons and I enjoy them for just that.

john,

don't ya think the pixar movies are more wholesome? yesh there could be things that kids don't get but they are more hidden and implicit. fox just ain't even in the competition quality-wise. dreamworks, on the other hand, is very explicit. shrek2, antz, shark tales and the upcoming madagascar are all very wild. i think it's 2much for the kids. same with father of the pride on TV. i just don't think parading inneundo in front of kids is my brand of entertainment.

That is why you have a choice Yi... Watch it or not, but they will keep making them. Anime is as far from Mickey Mouse as they get, and I wouldn't let my kids watch some of them with me. However, the stories and art are in many cases, absolutely fantastic.

Shrek and the rest do have some raciness, but not nearly as heavy as Austin Powers, or nearly as crude as Jay and Silent Bob. This is why kids have parents. I remember as a kid, wanting to see the cartoon about a cat named Fritz. it wasn't till many years later, when I saw it, and understood why my folks wouldn't let me.

What I actually miss is traditional animation. Everything mainstream has to be 3-D or nothing these days. To me all that amounts to is animation that's trying to look real but just doesn't. I personally really don't care how amazing the hair looks on some animated character - it still isn't real and doesn't look real.

Stop wasting 4-years at a time to show me fake hair - just gimme a story!

Side note - I personally feel that Finding Nemo is one of the best modern American 3-D animated films - for precisely the reason that the story is just plain written well. Such a well sculpted script, full of incredibly well-timed highs and lows, good character development, and just plain enjoyable hijinks through and through. And I really don't care how much the water looked like water.

Pixar creators get a lot of their inspiration from the creator of the Japanese animated movie "Spirited Away". But I forgot his name.

<<<-- Originally posted by Imran Zaidi :

And I really don't care how much the water looked like water. -->>>


Actually, Imran, the water looked *less* like water than it could have: in the original test animations, the animators made the water look too real, and were asked to make it less life-like.

Hehe - yeah, I saw that in the extra features of my DVD. That's probably why 'water' came to mind.

The same thing also happened with Shrek- Some of the characters looked too real, and they kicked it down a few notches.

<<<-- Originally posted by Joe Calalang : Pixar creators get a lot of their inspiration from the creator of the Japanese animated movie "Spirited Away". But I forgot his name. -->>>

Hayao Miyazaki

The genius.

<<on the other hand, is very explicit. shrek2, antz, shark tales and the upcoming madagascar are all very wild. i think it's 2much for the kids. same with father of the pride on TV. i just don't think parading inneundo in front of kids is my brand of entertainment.
<<
Yi Fong Yu, you've made the incorrect assumption that all animation is for kids. It's not. Shrek was rated PG, yet parents still complained because they though they were going to see a Disney flick and dropped of the kids for cheap babysitting. Same with others rated higher than 'G'. People not paying attention.

NBC spent months warning viewers 'Father of the Pride' was an adult oriented series, and still many complained and acted surprised. Lazy, and lame and possibly dishonest. Parent should not be letting their young children watch it.

Animation is a serious art form that can be made specifically for all walks of life, and all ages. Pay attention to the ratings given the movie and don't assume anything.

Anyone thinking animation (2d or 3d) should only be made for young children is doing it a serious disservice.

Dreamworks is every bit as good as Pixar IMHO. Disney would have ruined 'Moses'. I think Dreamworks is behind the up coming Polar Express?
Who ever is behind it, based on the promos, the level of what can be done with CG/3D is going way up. The facial animation alone is superb.

P.S. the vast majority of Japanese Animation is for the 13 and up crowd.

i didn't make the incorrect assumption, it is the parents that have =). that's my point.

i still remembered when i saw blade2 on opening weekend and was horrified not by the movie but by the attendance of children under 13. 90% of the cinema were parents who took their kids under 13! some were as young as 5 or 6! the saddest part wasn't the action of the parents to take 'em in the beginning but the saddest part was only a few left (due to "misunderstandings" i'm sure)... but most of them stayed! afterwards i heard a lot of parents saying to each other, "wow what a bloody movie" and the kids going, "YEAH MAN!!! let's watch it again!

re: animation. th prob with it is US parents have been traditionally used to Disney's brand of "animation" from 2D through 3D (Pixar's partnership). they simply don't have time to "look it up". when they hear about this or that new animation they automatically take kids to it regardless. good thing XXX japanime isn't more prevalent here... or US parents would take their kids to see that as well out of ignorance.

Originally, cartoon shorts were aimed at adult theater goers, not children. Woody Woodpecker is a perfect example- In one cartoon from the 30's or 40's, Woody is trying to get a room. The sign in the lobby clearly states "No Opium!"

Just because it is animated, there is no reason to believe it is for kids. Look at Heavy Metal as another example. Some of us never quite grew up, and thoroughly enjoy animation... regardless of it's rating.

Also, the original Popeye cartoons from way back. Some of the stuff Popeye would mutter under his breath were almost downright dirty. Nothing direct - all double entendres.

But this goes to the nature of a lot of classic cartoons - a lot of them were just shorts that would show along with the newsreel before a matinee - where there were definitely no children present.

At some point, I'm not sure when, the transition happened to where animation started seeming solely for kids. Anyone a cartoon historian around here? I've always been curious as to how that transition happened.

Yi Fong Yu, yes I see your point. When parents don't care, then the right wing religious crazies step in and decide they know wha't right for all of us. We can't let that happen.

4 more beers, 4 more beers.

John Ashcroft, public enemy #1.

Uh, oh, I bet this post is gonna get me on the no fly list. Oh well, if it's good enough for Ted Kennedy, it's good enough for me.

"At some point, I'm not sure when, the transition happened to where animation started seeming solely for kids. Anyone a cartoon historian around here? I've always been curious as to how that transition happened."

Throughout the 1950s when cartoon shorts progressively started being produced for television rather than for theatrical play, they took a decidedly kid-friendly twist, until the art form all but vanished in the 1960s. (When George Lucas, straight out of USC, won a prized Warner Brothers internship that allowed him to work in any department on the lot in 1968, he lusted to look over the shoulders of the artists in the studio's vaunted animation department, home of countless Looney Tunes classics and an extraordinary wealth of creative talent--only to discover that the department had been dismantled and no new cartoons were being produced.) Animation as a short form never really returned in force, but Disney's re-commitment to feature-length musical animation with The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, etc. in the 1990s revived the form as a family-friendly entertainment.

The past year at Walt Disney Feature Animation has seen greater transformation than since those early days when Jeffrey Katzenberg took over. The studio's new strategy seems to be an abandonment of traditional 2D animation in favor of 3D. Chicken Little is the studio's next big offering, coming out Summer 2005. It'll be 3D.

It's interesting; none of the Pixar films have been musicals, but Disney's biggest success has been the musical feature, not just on the screen, but also with stage adaptations that have grossed hundreds of millions in ticket sales.

well... toy story was kinda of a musical with songs.

Animation for adults has been returning to vogue. People in their late 20s and thirties grew up with Saturday morning and after school animation and still want it. Hence you see the gearing of many programmes on the Cartoon Network aimed partially at adults. Genndy Tartakovsky is popular for "Samurai Jack" and Lucas' "Clone Wars" shorts.

The Adult Swim set is definitely aimed at college age and above such as "Sealab 2021", "Aqua Teen Hunger Force", "The Venture Bros." "Invader Zim" and "The Tick" probably fly over the heads of any kids who see them. Adults I know continue to enjoy even overt superhero fare such as "Teen Titans" and "Justice League". "Spike and Mike's Festival of Animation" and their "Sick and Twisted" shows are always packed.

This is a demographic change, the same one that has popularized live action super hero fare in movies. Some critics might call this the infantilization of adults and that is partly true though it sneers at some real quality underneath the surface.

I've seen clips of Chicken Little. It's no Little Mermaid or Lion King. Anybody with one eye in his head can see that this strategy (trying to beat Pixar at their own game rather than making the musical movies they've always excelled at) won't turn out well for Disney.

Disney tried earlier with a failed Dinosaur movie, the animation was superb, the story lame. Shrek succeeded because it would have been funny in just about any medium. And it was most funny when it was making fun of Disney.