From the directors of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 21 Jump Street, and Clone High comes… The Lego Movie.
Chris Pratt plays Emmet, an ordinary dude mistakenly chosen to go on an epic adventure to stop President Business (Will Ferrell) from taking over the world, or something like that. Liam Neeson plays President Business’s henchman Bad Cop, who’s hot on his trail. Hey, and Superman is in it.
The Lego Movie also stars the voices of Morgan Freeman (which you already know if you saw the trailer), Alison Brie, Elizabeth Banks, Nick Offerman, and Will Arnett.
Paperman played in front of Wreck-It Ralph‘s theatrical run, and it was absolutely wonderful. (Your mileage may vary, but if you appreciate a little magical realism, you’ll probably dig it.) The music by Christophe Beck is lovely, the sort of hybrid 2D/CGI animation technique is lovely… It’s just a lovely short film. If you haven’t seen it, enjoy. If you have, I’m sure you’ll enjoy seeing it again.
This is a few days old, but grad school has me off my blogging game, so… whatever. Anyway.
The Wreck-It Ralph teaser sold me on this already, but for those of you who aren’t so sure yet, this new theatrical trailer gives us a closer look at the story (and the cameos!) in the Disney CGI feature.
Veteran Simpsons and Futurama director Rich Moore’s Wreck-It Ralph will wreck the box office on November 2, 2012. John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer, and Jane Lynch top-line the film, with Alan Tudyk, Mindy Kaling, Adam Carolla, Horatio Sanz and more rounding out the cast.
I missed this from a few days ago, but I’m all excited: French animator Michel Ocelot has made a third film starring the tiny-but-wise African folk hero Kirikou, Kirikou: Men and Women. The first two Kirikou films — Kirikou and the Sorceress and Kirikou and the Wild Beast are absolutely wonderful children’s movies — beautifully animated, with a wonderful 2D style.
With the new film, it looks like they’re using CG models, for an even cleaner line and smoother movement. (Do you call it cel shading if there’s no shading?) While I haven’t seen Ocelot’s previous effort, Azur et Asmar (a.k.a. The Princes’ Quest), the stiff CG I saw in the trailer was a bit of a turn-off. Here, the simpler colors on the figures makes this look much, much better. The film was made in 3D and should be out in France next February? I have no idea when it will make it here, of course, but a (very) limited release to a few art house theaters is likely.
The trailer is NSFW, I guess. It’s non-sexual nudity, albeit a lot of it — the African villagers, including Kirikou, don’t wear a lot of clothing. If you’ve seen the earlier films, you already know that. If you haven’t, I swear, it’s really a kid’s flick!
