For instance, whereas all Pixar has to offer next year is a Monsters Inc. prequel, Monsters University, while Disney Animation Studios will be offering a more promising film with Frozen, DreamWorks will be offering three films next year. Better yet, in defiance of the stereotype of the company, two of them are original and another takes a revisit of another Jay Ward classic series from his Rocky and Bullwinkle franchise.
Seeing the initial images, I can see that most of the characters have designs that will have to grow on me and the initial premise sounds a lot like a human version of Disney's mediocre 2000 attempt to enter the computer animated feature field, Dinosaurs. Like the reptiles and lemurs in that film, this family will be forced to make a hazardous migration after a natural disaster for a new home.
However, the film is going to be co-directed by Chris Sanders of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon and co-produced by Kristine Belson who produced the latter along with Jane Hartwell who produced the first and best Shrek film. That is a crew pedigree that is enough to convince me that something special out of this familiar premise.
Obviously, the idea of a snail gaining superspeed and wanting to become a racer owes more than a little inspiration from Pixar's Ratatouille with a rat who dreams of being a Haute Cuisine chef. However, whereas Remy the Rat is able to strive for his goal in secret, Turbo the Snail is going to have to do this in public in the competition since it would hardly be dramatic if he participates in hiding purely for his own personal satisfaction. That alone will be intriguing to see this bizarre situation and how the macho racing world would react to this snail.
The main pitfall is that Ratatouille was written and directed by Brad Bird, one of the greatest animation directors of our day. While the film will be co-written by Robert Siegel who wrote the great sports tragedy film, The Wrestler, the fact is that the director, David Soren, hardly has the career experience and reputation to encourage me. However, since Bird has abandoned the animation field, then I hope Soren and other newcomers are ready to take his place like DreamWorks Animation has shone so far.
So far, the track record of Jay Ward film adaptation's has been disappointing with the first George of the Jungle film having a Rotten Tomatoes score of 56% while The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle has 42% and Dudley Do-Right with only 14%. It seems that so far, nobody has really been able to emulate Ward's intelligent manic wit even with his daughter, Tiffany Ward, as executive producer.
However, this film will be directed by Rob Minkoff whose track record includes The Lion King and the fantasy premise of fouled up history can at least provide a fertile ground for an wacky story like a more erudite version of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. If Robert Downey Jr. had stayed on the project as Peabody, then this would be something to really be confident about.
The big question however will any of these have the kind of soul that How to Train Your Dragon and Kung Fu Panda? Will any of these touch into something deeper that I must experience again? Madagascar 3 managed to do that this year, seeing Alex and friends come to learn what home really is after all their adventures and finding that they have become more than ever thought they could be. That is an artistic magic that Pixar's Brave had to struggle to achieve until after its first third while Laika's ParaNorman got it in an entire different way.
Regardless, I see DreamWorks striving forward from here with real artistic gambles. Whether they work out is going to be an experience I look forward to next year.
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