By Susan Wloszczyna, USA TODAY
With 20th Century Fox's Rio topping the box office, animation is making a dent in the decline in ticket sales. USA TODAY's Susan Wloszczyna checks out the state of 'toons at all six major studios.
Sony Pictures Animation
It's getting to look a lot like Christmas, Arthur Christmas, an animated film coming from Sony Pictures Animation in November.
Sony Pictures Animation
It's getting to look a lot like Christmas, Arthur Christmas, an animated film coming from Sony Pictures Animation in November.
20th Century Fox
Fox-owned Blue Sky, based in Connecticut, has prided itself on being smaller and scrappier than its West Coast competitors ever since the first Ice Age in 2002. "We are still a David in an arena of Goliaths," says producer/director Chris Wedge, who helped co-found the company. Whereas bigger animation houses can crank out up to three films in one year, "we tend to do one every year to 18 months."
Two movies are in the works: next year's Ice Age: Continental Drift and The Legend of the Leaf Man, based on a book by author/illustrator William Joyce, who was a production designer and producer on Robots in 2005. The plot: An army of bugs fights an evil spider with help from the mythical Leaf Men.
Disney/Pixar
Hurdles might await Pixar, which has reigned supreme over the cartoon kingdom since 1995's Toy Story, the first computer-animated feature. Last year's Toy Story 3 is being followed by another sequel this summer, Cars 2 ?a detour from the studio's usual track record with such highly original material as WALL?E and Up. Then there is Monsters University, a prequel to Monsters, Inc., due in 2013.
Fans of diversity were initially pleased that next year's Brave would boast Pixar's first female lead and its first female director, Brenda Chapman (The Prince of Egypt). But then Mark Andrews was brought in and now shares directing credit.
As for Disney proper, it is still redefining its path in the computer age, although last year's unexpectedly popular fairy-tale comedy Tangled offers hope. The motion-capture Mars Needs Moms flopped, but the offbeat premise of 2012's Reboot Ralph, about a washed-up video-game character, sounds promising. Expect the tried-and-true as well, such as this summer's reawakening of Winnie the Pooh.
DreamWorks/
Paramount
DreamWorks may seem to be marking time with a sequel (Kung Fu Panda 2) and a Shrek spinoff (Puss in Boots) this year. But barely a week goes by without another title being announced. No fewer than 24 features are in various stages of production, including everything from a racing snail (Turbo) to a full-length film based on that TV golden oldie Mr. Peabody & Sherman. "The plan is to release five films every two years," says chief creative officer Bill Damaschke. DreamWorks distributor Paramount has begun to go beyond its Rugrats-type TV-spawned vehicles to produce more ambitious titles such as Rango and Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, coming at year's end.
Warner Bros.
The home of Bugs Bunny prefers to concentrate its efforts on live-action titles that attract all ages. That includes its D.C. Comics franchises, including Batman and this summer's launch of Green Lantern, as well as its incredibly popular eight-film Harry Potter series, which wraps this summer with Part 2 of The Deathly Hallows. With the first of two Hobbit adventures coming in 2012, Peter Jackson and company should take up some of that box-office slack after the boy wizard bids adieu.
However, Warner continues to distribute animated films done outside the studio confines, including last year's Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole and this fall's HappyFeet 2, a follow-up to its 2006 Oscar winner about a dancing penguin.
Universal
With last year's hit Despicable Me, the studio has become a serious player in the 'toon game, thanks to Chris Meledandri, the former Fox animation chief whose Illumination Entertainment has become Universal's main provider of family fare ? including live-action and animated mixes like Hop. As for cartoon vehicles, Meledandri hopes to avoid any uniformity in the look and story of such projects as Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, out in 2012; a stop-motion version of The Addams Family, directed by Tim Burton; and Flanimals, based on a series of children's books by comic Ricky Gervais. Instead, Meledandri says, the emphasis is on strong characters. "The visuals, the comedy, the plot are all there to support the characters."
Sony
Most of Sony's upcoming titles promise a lighthearted tone similar to its 2009 hit Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. That includes the computer-animated Arthur Christmas, the initial offering born of a partnership with animation house Aardman (Wallace & Gromit) that will open at Thanksgiving. In the pipeline for next year are The Pirates!Band of Misfits, a second collaboration with Aardman done in stop-motion, and Hotel Transylvania, whose guests include Dracula, the Mummy and the Werewolf. Sony is even planning a feature-length Popeye.
"We are careful not to have an in-house style," says Bob Osher, president of Sony Pictures Digital Production. "I don't see animation as a genre but a technique. We look for good stories and allow them to dictate the look and feel." Just announced: Muncle Trogg, based on a children's book about an oddball giant.
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