SWillie! wrote:
Have you guys not heard the thousand times that people have said American Dog was awful?
Yes, some anonymous "insiders" have claimed to have seen early reels and proclaimed the film to have been a "mess". So what? Every film has story problems but you persist and resolve them. You cannot judge from early reels or some storyboards whether the finished film would be the same since during the process of creating an animated film a lot of things get reworked and rewritten. I just find hard to believe that the creators of such critical successes like
Lilo & Stitch and
How to Train Your Dragon could not have made this film work eventually.
Here's what
John Sanford said about
American Dog:
Quote:
Almost every single animated film ever made is “unwatchable” or “an unmitigated disaster” for the first few screenings.
Then, with a little support and a lot of hard work, they come together.
I’ll say this about American Dog:
It endured 2 years of fussing by David Stainton.
Then The Pixar group came in and dictated that almost EVERYTHING be changed, including some of the more fantastic elements. A big one? Chris wanted the dog to talk. “That doesn’t make any sense!” The Pixar group declared! Talking cars are okay, and a house can be lifted by balloons but a talking dog?
Well, that is just ridiculous.
Chris’s original movie was like “The Big Lebowksi” meets “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” with talking animals.
SWillie! wrote:
We had not heard a thing quality-wise on what Brenda Chapman's version of Brave was like. All we knew were the very basic plot points or characters. For all anyone knows, it was horrible, and there's very good reason she got kicked off.
Disney and Pixar artists such as
Floyd Norman,
Tom Sito,
Mike Gabriel, and
John Saford have defended Brenda's talent and skills.
Tom Sito wrote:
I worked with Brenda on Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King and The Prince of Egypt. In every project her creativity was only outshone by her engaging personality and poise. She is one of the finest artists working in animation today.
Floyd Norman wrote:
Brenda is indeed a class act, and for this old animation veteran the news is heartbreaking.
Mike Gabriel wrote:
Brenda is a class act. A beautiful soul. A star talent in the industry who continues to inspire, more so in adversity than a smooth ride.
John Sanford, however, gives a more detailed picture of the specific project Chapman had been working on and the possible reasons she was removed.
Quote:
Directing not her forte?
Horsesh**.
Brenda was doing a great job. I saw the movie 3 years ago and it was awesome.
Brenda was shoved aside because she was doing an unconventional movie in a studio that fears failure.
They are second-guessing themselves to death.
Director driven studio indeed.
Quote:
They took a look at her movie and couldn’t fit it into any box they had, and so they took it away from her and gave it to someone else.
A movie that SHE conceived, She nurtured, and she worked hard to make a reality.
Then, they trumpet it to the heavens that “Pixar has a FEMALE director!!! Huzzah!”
So what happened? She made a movie that didn’t fit into the “Pixar mold”, and these guys are afraid of failure, so they make a few changes. One of those changes is that Brenda is no longer directing.
The Pixar powers that be smugly tell everybody that it’s all about the story and that it’s a director’s studio.
Sure it is.
Quote:
I do know that her movie was unconventional and that it was unpopular with certain members of the “Brain Trust” because of this.
I can speculate based on other cases, the Chris Sanders thing, the Jan Pinkava thing, the Newt deal, and the troubles Brad and his Incredibles gang endured when they first arrived up there.
I know how things work up there. You play by their rules. It’s their game.
Like I said, I’d have no problem with this if they just fessed up and admitted that they are a business and no better than anyone else.
Quote:
I do know more about this firing then most of you do. I wouldn’t be talking about it if I didn’t.
No I haven’t seen the movie recently. I saw the MOVIE (not just a pitch) 3 years ago and it was brilliant. It was truly awesome, even in it’s rough state. One of the best early screenings I’ve ever seen. All they had to was build and shape.
I have it on good authority that it has been “noted to death”.
No I have not talked to Brenda. However, this was a movie that she wrote and conceived. She based the central character on her DAUGHTER.
Quote:
“What if the film was heading in a direction that would see lower gross revenue? ”
Well that’s great. Let’s do that everytime.
Here is the problem.
See, there was this little movie that Disney released a few years back that they were sure was going to bomb, so they didn’t support it with merch or a decent release date.
The fim? Toy Story.
There was another a few years before that everyone in the studio was sure was going to be a massive bomb.
Hell, I remember hearing execs at Disney expressing fears that The Incredibles would alienate Pixar’s “core audience”.
In other words, that excuse is flimsy, and cowardly.
I am well aware Pixar is a company. It’s a company that got where it is by taking RISKS.
Not kneading their hands and worrying like a bunch of old women.
Quote:
I would accept the possibility that the film just wasn’t working,….except that I saw a screening that was truly amazing. It was a film full of heart, brilliant characters, and great moments. I left the screening thinking “Holy sh**! This is going to open things up around here the way The Incredibles did!” The problems the film did have were fixable.
The idea that this movie wasn’t her cup of tea is laughable. She conceived it from the ground up! For the film not to be working at this point, someone must have thrown a pretty big monks wrench into it.
Source:
http://www.cartoonbrew.com/feature-film ... brave.html
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Even when Pixar's movies have a "pairing up" at the end, the romance rarely ever plays a significant part of the movie--Woody and Bo Peep and Buzz and Jessie had very little point (as a couple) to the first two Toy Story's. The only one's I can think of where romance/a couple was the centerpoint was Cars and The Incredibles.
