“All eyes will be on a little chicken this weekend as Disney releases its first home-grown, entirely computer-generated feature,” Sandy Brown reports for TheStreet.com. “If Chicken Little has wings — and it’s far from certain that it will, given the recent uneven results from Disney’s once-storied animated studio — it could help the media giant reassert itself just as high-profile talks loom with Pixar’s Steve Jobs. On the other hand, if the sky falls, Jobs will have a little more leverage when the parties start serious negotiations in coming weeks.”
“‘I think it has huge implications,'” one media analyst says of the movie’s box office performance. “‘I think it might show that they [Disney] can’t seem to get animation right and need a relationship with Pixar.'” To be sure, one of the big questions in lotus land these days is what will become of the Disney/Pixar relationship — and for that matter the Pixar animation studio’s future, given its distribution situation,” Brown reports. “Marla Backer of Soleil Securities says that neither Disney nor Pixar is expecting Pixar-like numbers out of Chicken Little. In essence, unless the movie unexpectedly does enormous box office, Backer believes the two parties will move closer to a new distribution deal.”
Full article here.
Advertisement: The New iPod with Video. The ultimate music + video experience on the go. From $299. Free shipping.
Related articles:
Disney’s ‘Chicken Little’ crammed with snarky pop culture references, lacks qualities of Pixar films – November 04, 2005
Report: Steve Jobs would consider selling Pixar – October 31, 2005
Steven P. is not worried. He can distribute plenty through the store and can be completely vertically integrated. He will have the whole widget.
Chicken Little. Hmmm… Analysts should see this movie.
The reviews are already bad.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/Movies/11/04/ew.movie.little/index.html
…And Pixar is up 2.63%, do people think Chicken Little is made by Pixar?
Critics’ Tomatometer stands at 38% Cream of the crop Tomatometer is at 13%.
Yowch.
Disney is sort of the Microsoft of animation these days. Universally despised, no imagination, copying everyone else, suing people rather than innovating, coasting on the ownership of one product that people can’t avoid. Then I’ve always said Windows is a Mickey Mouse operating system.
A more interesting plot would have been to make Chicken Little a reporter. Have him wade into the aftermath of some natural disaster and predict tens of thousands of deaths, blaming everyone except those he approves of, and having him express shock when it didn’t all materialize.
There’s a lesson in there.
It’s all about the writing…. If the writing sucks then the movie sucks. Pixar producers have somehow managed to have clever writing for their movies. High quality animation software abounds but quality writing is nowhere to be found and can’t be bought in stores.
Slightly off topic, but am I the only one worried that “Cars” (Pixar’s summer 06 movie) looks too cutesy and Disneyfied? The previews I’ve seen look very “Herbie the Love Bug” to me. I hope I’m wrong, and I probably will be. Pixar has an impeccable track record.
I am also concerned about “Cars”. It just doesn’t seem to have that same unique feel that the other Pixar movies have had. I know it’s too early to tell, but with the trailers of the previous Pixar movies you could tell that there was something special about them. I’m not getting that feeling with “Cars” yet.
Back on topic…
As far as the quality of the animation in “Chicken Little”, it looks really nice to me. But like others have said, it’s the writing that makes a story. Just look at “The Phantom Menace”, great visuals…story sucked. I know it made lots of money, but it’s a little bit different scenario than Pixar/Disney.
It’s the story, Stoopid!:-)
Thanks guys for the compliments. Hopefully you will like Cars and the 2 future projects <wink> that are coming down the pipe line.
And yes, there are a ton of Macs all over our campus. =)
maybe it’s because my interest in cars is close to zero – but I really have to twice previous comments regarding the Cars trailer: it’s not funny or edgy at all! Talking cars, now how retired is that? I got so happy at the time when I heard Lasseter is making one more with Pixar, I mean…the guy’s a genious. However I’m afraid something went wrong this time. It certainly looks like the first Pixar I won’t watch. :(**
Last paragraph from East Valley Tribune
“It’s this sort of falseness that one rarely sees in really good animated films — for instance, the movies of Pixar (“Finding Nemo,” “The Incredibles”). Unfortunately, Pixar and Disney are no longer friends, and “Chicken Little” proves that the latter has some serious issues to work out.”
Full article here:
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/index.php?sty=52353
Disney is run by a sales committee.
There are no creative visionaries in the top seats at disney.
Cars looks ugly as well as outdated. Very surprising, and a let down too, considering cars are a real good 3D subjects.
Cars with Disneyish eyes… Give me a break.
I’ll wait until I see Cars before passing judgement. After misjudging Nemo (now really, come on, a movie about fish? Oh yeah, that’s gonna do boffo BO), I learned ny lesson.
Patience.
And I’ll wait until I personally see Chicken Little. I like the previews I’ve seen.
And, BTW, I seem to recall reading somewhere that Chicken was done by another studio, la Pixar. Anyone know for certain?
“Chicken pot, chicken pot, chicken pot piiiiiiiiiiiiiiie!”
A blank ad pops up NOT ONCE but again and again! I can’t even search the page, because when the Find window comes up, the ad banner comes up in front of it!
And each time it goes away before I can close it, but then it comes right back!
THIS IS MUCH WORSE THAN THE USUAL POPUP JUNK ON MDN.
So long as APPLE is doing ok, I really don’t care about Pixar. It is nice for Apple to have an “in” with hollywood, but that’s about all it is worth.
I prefer dreamworks films, though I’m not 8.
Risky business, the movie business is: a few hits tend to pay for many flops. The larger your output, the better.
One comment regarding the Cars trailers.
All of the Pixar film trailers have been cut by Disney… NOT Pixar.
What you are seeing is Disney asking for whatever is rendered and trying to create a compelling trailer from it. The final Cars feature will be almost no resemblance to the trailers you are seeing.
Another Bad review!
Chicken Little’ Throws Fowl Ball
Disney’s first homegrown computer-animated film is one of the more painful moviegoing experiences in years, a contrived bit of barnyard pat dubbed Chicken Little.
http://www.space.com/entertainment/051104_ent_chickenlittle.html
Well I don’t know about the long run but boy was Finding Nemo a gem of a movie.
The model texture rendering of “Chicken Little” is extremely cheap; not even close to the quality of “Finding Nemo”, and not even on the same planet as Sulley’s fur in “Monsters, Inc.” The decision to make the characters look like quasi-clay animation would be from a lack of time to render from slow processors and a rush to production. The software is readily available to make fur and feathers, but someone is obviously taking the shortest and cheapest route to production.
…and the plot is unimaginative, too.
I completely agree that Disney has become the Microsoft of animation, and after having grown up on a steady diet of Disney, that makes me very sad.