What I would give...
As I write this, the Screenwriting Expo 5 is going on in LA. And who should be speaking there but... Pixar artists! Man, do I want to be there now! Oh well, they release DVDs of past speakers, so maybe I'll buy it if comes out (fingers crossed!) Speakers include Andrew Stanton, Brad Bird, Dan Gerson, David Reynolds, Lee Unkrich, Mark Andrews, Jim Capobianco, Ronnie del Carmen, and Jason Katz.
But what's really cool is that I picked up a few juicy tidbits from the website here, including the fact that Jim Capobianco is the story supervisor for Ratatouille and an upcoming project directed by former sound designer extraordinaire Gary Rydstrom ("Lifted"), which might be written by Kiel Murray. In addition to the speakers listed, there are two more writer-director pairs. One is Lee Unkrich and Mike Arndt, writer of Little Miss Sunshine. I myself have not seen it, but I've heard nothing but good things about it. To my knowledge, Arndt hasn't written a Pixar film yet, which means he's writing one that's coming up.
And then... Brenda Chapman and Irene Mecchi!! Which implies that Chapman is finally directing a future Pixar project! She's worked on Chicken Run, Cars, Little Mermaid, Beauty & the Beast, and Aladdin, was story supervisor for The Lion King, and directed the Prince of Egypt. P of E was not written by Irene Mecchi, but Mecchi has written screenplays for The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Hercules. I think Chapman is a very talented, but overlooked woman; there's quite a nice interview with her in the book Makin' Toons by Allan Neuwirth. Although she directed P of E, there were two other directors on that project. P of E is not a bad film, but I can't help wondering if it had been better had it been a sole Chapman project. The two other directors, Steve Hickner and Simon Wells, have a pretty dismal track record, having produced or directed such Amblimation flops like An American Tail 2, Balto, and We're Back! (That is not my exclamation point.) And it seems that she's working in a company that will really let her abilities shine. I'm sure DreamWorks Animation looked pretty attractive in the beginning, but once they stopped doing 2D, it was clear that they weren't aiming for quality. I'm happy for her, as well as for James Baxter and Aardman, two other extremely talented former DreamWorks entities.
But what's really cool is that I picked up a few juicy tidbits from the website here, including the fact that Jim Capobianco is the story supervisor for Ratatouille and an upcoming project directed by former sound designer extraordinaire Gary Rydstrom ("Lifted"), which might be written by Kiel Murray. In addition to the speakers listed, there are two more writer-director pairs. One is Lee Unkrich and Mike Arndt, writer of Little Miss Sunshine. I myself have not seen it, but I've heard nothing but good things about it. To my knowledge, Arndt hasn't written a Pixar film yet, which means he's writing one that's coming up.
And then... Brenda Chapman and Irene Mecchi!! Which implies that Chapman is finally directing a future Pixar project! She's worked on Chicken Run, Cars, Little Mermaid, Beauty & the Beast, and Aladdin, was story supervisor for The Lion King, and directed the Prince of Egypt. P of E was not written by Irene Mecchi, but Mecchi has written screenplays for The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Hercules. I think Chapman is a very talented, but overlooked woman; there's quite a nice interview with her in the book Makin' Toons by Allan Neuwirth. Although she directed P of E, there were two other directors on that project. P of E is not a bad film, but I can't help wondering if it had been better had it been a sole Chapman project. The two other directors, Steve Hickner and Simon Wells, have a pretty dismal track record, having produced or directed such Amblimation flops like An American Tail 2, Balto, and We're Back! (That is not my exclamation point.) And it seems that she's working in a company that will really let her abilities shine. I'm sure DreamWorks Animation looked pretty attractive in the beginning, but once they stopped doing 2D, it was clear that they weren't aiming for quality. I'm happy for her, as well as for James Baxter and Aardman, two other extremely talented former DreamWorks entities.
posted by Shadowbird... at 12:13 PM
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