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Cannes Exclusive: Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studio “2015 and beyond” Preview

Posted by Piers McCarthy in Animated, Film, Headline, News | 0 comments

When the opportunity arose to miss a Cannes screening, and instead see a preview – presented by John Lasseter – of Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios’ upcoming releases, the animation greats took precedence. And what a treat it was – two hours of footage, images and descriptions of 5 new projects, as well as a full preview of

. Photos, videos and audio recordings were prohibited, but I can hopefully paint a picture of what I learnt and saw…

Lasseter started the talk off by professing his love for Cannes, showing a newspaper excerpt, comically criticising the appearance of Pixar’s men at the 2009 premiere of

in Cannes. He went on to say how the country has served him well, especially for wine. A brief promotion for his wife’s winery happened (sparking a few “hmmm”’s from new, potential customers in the audience), then he got down to his side of things – the management of two universally treasured, and accomplished studios – Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios.

A short video showed the amazing San Francisco Bay headquarters, facilities, fun and hard work all under one roof, starting the talk on Pixar.

(review here), which premiered a few nights ago on the Croisette. His studio is expanding, and

marks another “what if…” story into the catalogue of films. He didn’t need to touch on that film as much, with many people in the room having already seen it, or who were at least aware of it. This wasn’t to be two hours of

’s promotional tour, this was a special preview, held as a thank you from Lasseter to Cannes, and just for…well, fun.

. Lasseter introduced the film with a brief clip, so far unseen by any press. The clip was as follows:

A meteor belt floats in deep space, a ringlet of meteors following on another around and around. One gets too close to another and bumps it out of regular motion. It gathers momentum and starts hurtling towards Earth. We cut to Earth, a dark blue sky, with dinosaurs grazing in the night. The shot switches back to the meteorite, now gathering a lot of speed and burning up. It just glides back the Earth’s orbit. We cut back to the dinosaurs, looking up at a shooting star then returning to grazing. So, what if an asteroid hadn’t hit Earth those billion of years ago…?

The audience laughed and room lights went back up. Lasseter clicks the PowerPoint, showing the title, and starts to run through the crew listings.

director Peter Sohn will be at the helm, with Mychael Donna as composer, and an “amazing” sound design by Craig Berkley. Lasseter explains that this will be the first to use new technology to get photo-realistic CGI shots. He shows us some footage of foliage and mountain ranges and it is like seeing a shot from a David Attenborough documentary. The wildlife is astonishing (and this is the only shot that will be blow my mind), and clearly a major step up.

includes one or two shots in the real-world part of the story, all of which look dazzlingly realistic; this is the future of Pixar – continual advancement.

The story follows Arlo, a dinosaur who lives with his farming family (as the dinosaurs have evolved, they have become farmer-like survivalists, living off the land). He has a close relationship with his father, but sadly he dies. The next worse thing to happen is he gets caught up in a river’s flow and bangs his head, waking up far down the river. When he wakes up he is face-to-face with Spot, a feral child. Together they become friends and try to move back to Arlo’s home.

The story was explained in more detail but this was the general gist. Lasseter explained that it was a dog and his companion story, but in this case Spot – the human child – is the dog, and Arlo is more human. Arlo can speak, from the clips shown, and Spot is animalistic and supposed to be a very basic, early, human form.

He showed us a clip of Arlo and Spot bonding whilst on the journey, communicating with each other about their families. It has the warm heart Disney and Pixar are famed for, not to mention some expert photography/CGI. Other supporting characters were shown, including some cute-looking ferret creatures and the villainous raptors (different to the renowned

idea, and in the feather-stages of evolution). Obviously, because it’s a dino movie, there has to be T-rexs, and they look great – butch and very square in design. It looks as though they’ll be helpful to Arlo, but that could have been misinterpreted by me. Still, Pixar’s take on dinosaurs will not only be fun, it will be undoubtedly be immensely successful (kids love dinosaurs!).

The film is due to be released around November this year, a rarity with Pixar – releasing two films in one year.

. He initiated the next film’s talk by showing a clip from

. It’s the moment where Marlin meets Dory and she mentions her family: “I have short-term memory; it runs in the family. Or, at least I think it does…Hhmm…Where are there?” It’s that question that stuck in Pixar’s creative team’s minds. So, for the sequel, they will be tracking them down. Andrew Stanton will be writing and directing, for a release date of summer 2016.

Diane Keaton will play Dory’s mother, Eugene Levy as the father (we got a preview of a animation test complete with the pair’s voice-over, and they fit right into the

world), and the story will take place 6 months after the first. Dory is settled in with Marlin and Nemo and goes to school with the latter. One day, watching the sting rays move in a herd, as part of their migration (a brief bit of animation showed this, and it looked so beautiful), sparks a long-lost memory of Dory’s, and she sets out to find their migration trail. This leads them to California, to an oceanic research and rehabilitation centre for injured sea animals/creatures. There’s a new batch of characters here, including an immensely cute otter (an animation test got everyone going, “Aaawww” for a few seconds), lazy sea lions, a whale shark with a confused identity, a beluga whale who believes has a head injury and is not aware of his skull structure, and finally an escapist octopus. Research on the film led the team to find octopus can get out of nearly any confinement, and can walk on nearly every surface (“except Astroturf, for some reason”, noted Lasseter). The octopus’ animation was both a struggle and vastly enjoyable – a clip of its moment proved this. The octopus swings from vent pipes, and then picks up six of his tentacles in order to run on two. It looked hilarious and already proved to be a new favourite character for most.

. Lasseter will be directing, and all he could say was it was a new chapter – nothing about it being a follow-up – and is a very personal story for him. Read into that what you will…

this year (feel old yet?), so that’s something to celebrate. Lasseter and co tried to count how many computer animated films have come along since

and they reached a ball-park figure of 250. Talk about setting a trend.

After running through those films, Lasseter moved onto Walt Disney Animation Studios.

A 2 minute video compiling clips of Disney’s 90-year run proved how beloved they are, and what amazing films they’ve brought us. It also reminded everyone about the joy and beauty of hand-drawn animation. Sadly, the two films discussed are each CGI, yet still look lovely.

and loved the concept of talking animals in human clothing. So

is set in a fictional world of just animals. They have anthropomorphised and live in a city divided into sections. Climate change for certain areas with certain animals, and what the film aims to show is the blot of prejudice on society and ways to overcome it; a Disney lesson for the modern-day cosmopolitan cities.

The story is centred on Judy Hopps (played by Jennifer Goodwin), an optimistic rabbit who works for the police. She’s sent on an assignment to find a missing person, and ends up employing the help of a cunning, con-man fox, Nick Wilde (played by Jason Bateman). We had four extensive clips from the film, including Judy first meeting the Bateman’s Nick, Judy at home after a bad day of working tell herself to “suck it up”, a meeting with a mob-boss, and a scene where they get help from a DMV worker about a licence plate. I won’t go into detail about the latter, but it was absolutely hilarious. The room was alive and shaking with laughter, and I can’t wait to see it again in the final film. The DMV is a good target for comedy, and Disney have done wonders with its inherent obstacles.

As enjoyable as the film looked, it was only the DMV clip, and characters looking like the

island animals, it didn’t feel typically Disney. Many artwork images and basic rendering of scenes (many with raw storyboards) had hand-drawn animation in use. One subway shot, with a moving set of characters, had the look of

in terms of sketchy animation. It looked and felt instantly Disney-esque, but the real shame is knowing it’s been passed on as an idea in favour of a cheaper/easier CGI job. When Lasseter began the Walt Disney Animation Studios talk, especially mentioning the

, I was hopeful what we’d see was a return to classical craft.

The hope that hand-drawn animation was back, was again dashed when we saw aspects of

. Many concept pieces were hand-drawn and looked SUBLIME. It was like

with double the man-power and scope. I was getting very excited, and Lasseter dropped the bomb that it was another CGI project. His final clip from

eventually changed my mind, but more on that later.

follows a tribal princess of a long-lost tribe who are noted in history of discovering island in the South Pacific for 3000 years. There were 1000 years where they stopped – for unknown reasons – and

follows the eponymous heroine who wants to be a navigator, bringing back the centuries-old tradition. The father does not want her to get into danger, whilst her grandmother nurtures the adventurous side. When the grandmother dies, Moana sets out to follow her wishes. She gets caught up in a storm and washes ashore to find demi-god Maui inhabiting the island. He was a folklore hero, who could fish up island from the ocean floor with his magic hook. One fight with an evil spirit loses him his hook-staff and Moana finds him post-loss. Together they get back out to the ocean, battling sea monsters, and building up to fighting Maui’s nemesis and regaining his powers.

It’s a similar yarn to most Disney films – a heroic journey – but has this ancient, South Pacific vibe to it. Lasseter showed us a lot of character profiles, all of them looking typically Disney and full of life without any animation. There’s a pig side-kick for Moana, and a grumpy rooster that later joins, and one badass-looking spirit foe.

We also saw the research crews trips to the islands (a nice perk to the job), learning about the culture from many citizens. 8 or 9 people are now consultants on the film as they are trying to get this story as sincere as possible. The music is a crucial part as this will be a musical. With

directors Ron Clements and John Musker directing, this should be a musically-alive film. We got to see the opening sequence (in scraps of storyboard and semi-rendered clips), which is a musical-opening. The song had a strong drum rhythm and tribal hymns, before moving into English lyrics (much like

was the animation. During research many citizens told the team how important the sea was, and how it was a character in the history of their ancestors. This changed the film slightly and Moana became a princess with powers – an ability to interact with the water. Parting sections of the ocean and playing with the water as if it was a pet meant the water had to look good. They had the technology from

required more due to its essential water element. Our final clip showed a toddler Moana having the ocean reveal shells by lifting itself off the floor to uncover them. It then splashes her, and parts itself to show her a turtle swim by (like seeing it through a watery window). With the South Pacific clear blue water, the colour was awe-inspiring. The effects were so magnificent, corresponding with the twee Disney princess and bright colour palette, that you can understand the amount of work put into this. It will be probably be one of Disney’s best after

, and will take things in a new direction for their CGI department.

Two hours passed incredibly quickly, and everyone left elated about what is to come. Lasseter took over Walt Disney Animation Studios and looks to lead in amazing directions. And, of course, Pixar couldn’t be in better hands. That company is his baby, and he is nurturing it so well. We’ve passed the

downslide and what’s next (despite two more sequels), is looking terrific.

Thanks to Disney – specifically, Stu Oakley – for the invitation, and for Lasseter and Cannes for running the event.

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