The state and future of animation

General Discussions, Polls, Lists, Video Clips and Links
Post Reply
AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 5192
Joined: September 27th, 2007

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by EricJ » October 5th, 2021, 3:07 pm

Dacey wrote:
October 5th, 2021, 2:39 pm
But Spider-Verse didn’t have its marketing “sabotaged”…
I’m confused. Again.
It was "dumped" in pre-Christmas week during a notoriously crowded month, which meant Sony either
A) wanted to hit that Avatar/Hobbit sci-fi audience,
OR
B ) they didn't know how to sell an action cartoon on a franchise whose live-action movies were suffering bad critical comparisons to Disney's MCU, sneaked it out the traditional week of the year that the critics were on vacation, and, like WB's Aquaman, hoped they'd get a few core fanboys in between the rest of the traffic jam.

Certainly the fact that it WAS non-MCU Sony-Spidey (and the "Miles, not Peter" looked like cheap petty studio rivalry) made non-fanboy audiences wary during its first release, until the "No way?...Way!" word of mouth from those who did see it started to kick in by after-Christmas school-vacation and the January empty-theater doldrums.

AV Team
AV Team
Posts: 6634
Joined: February 8th, 2005
Location: The US of A

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Dacey » October 5th, 2021, 5:47 pm

Eric, this has gotten really boring...

There is no scenario in which Sony was "dumping" a film they had been hyping up for more than a year and releasing during the most lucrative month on the calendar. They had a trailer before Jumanji. The fans were pretty much on board once they saw that footage, and from there, excitement for it only grew as Sony released more content for a movie they clearly had a lot of confidence in.

To even try to equate it with how WB handled IG is non-sensical.
"Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift--that is why it's called the present."

User avatar
AV Founder
AV Founder
Posts: 25294
Joined: October 22nd, 2004
Location: London, UK

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Ben » October 5th, 2021, 5:48 pm

EricJ wrote:
October 5th, 2021, 1:50 pm
Iron Giant was the Into the Spiderverse of its day: The non-Disney/Pixar animated movie you had to actually go and butts-in-seats SEE
Except…no one did.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 459
Joined: May 24th, 2021

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by GeffreyDrogon » October 5th, 2021, 6:00 pm

Lionsgate has quite a huge collection of films from various studios in its library. Total Recall (the Arnold version), Reservoir Dogs, and Dirty Dancing come to mind.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 1923
Joined: December 16th, 2004
Location: Burbank, Calif.

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by droosan » October 5th, 2021, 6:41 pm

Ben wrote:
October 5th, 2021, 5:48 pm
EricJ wrote:
October 5th, 2021, 1:50 pm
Iron Giant was the Into the Spiderverse of its day: The non-Disney/Pixar animated movie you had to actually go and butts-in-seats SEE
Except…no one did.
I'm among the few who can say I saw The Iron Giant in theaters several times during its 1999 theatrical run -- including two 'sneak preview' viewings, prior to its official premiere. 8)

.. and also including one Friday evening in September '99 when I saw The Iron Giant with an audience of perhaps six other people .. immediately followed by a viewing of Disney's Tarzan on another screen in the same theater (still playing, since June), with more than half the seats full. :|

I also somehow achieved the incredible feat of seeing Cats Don't Dance three times, during the six days it was in our local Burbank theater, in 1997. :mrgreen:

User avatar
AV Founder
AV Founder
Posts: 25294
Joined: October 22nd, 2004
Location: London, UK

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Ben » October 5th, 2021, 7:52 pm

I was lucky enough to catch it twice in a cinema: once at a "multi media" press preview, where sadly half the audience had left the after the previous film had played (I don’t remember what that was, but it was either Mel Gibson's Payback or Deep Blue Sea — yeah, press showings used to get some funky double bills: one of the best was Gladiator with…Flintstones In Viva Rock Vegas!), and then again a few weeks later. Both times I went with a pal (who, funny enough, I just spoke to on the phone for the first time in months tonight) and both times we were absolutely wowed. Sadly, we may as well have been in private screenings each time, as we were essentially the only ones there and it disappeared from our local theatre within a week or two.

I don’t think Cats even got a theatrical release here, and still isn’t at all known for the most part. I eventually saw it by importing the LaserDisc. Hey, at least it was widescreen! :)

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 5192
Joined: September 27th, 2007

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by EricJ » October 6th, 2021, 3:15 pm

Ben wrote:
October 5th, 2021, 7:52 pm
I don’t think Cats even got a theatrical release here, and still isn’t at all known for the most part. I eventually saw it by importing the LaserDisc. Hey, at least it was widescreen! :)
Cats Don't Dance got a summer theatrical release over here, but by that point, the audience was treating Fox and Warner 90's-wannabes as cinematic speed-bumps.
And even then, most of the promotion was over "Ted Turner produces an animated Singin' in the Rain!" (since Turner was pumping "their" three-pronged marketing for Oz, Gone With the Wind and Singin', in the late 80's/early 90's), which was not a helpful comparison.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 9996
Joined: September 1st, 2006

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Daniel » October 6th, 2021, 3:34 pm

I don't consider March summer.

User avatar
AV Founder
AV Founder
Posts: 25294
Joined: October 22nd, 2004
Location: London, UK

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Ben » October 6th, 2021, 3:45 pm

May at the earliest. And end of May at that.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 459
Joined: May 24th, 2021

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by GeffreyDrogon » October 13th, 2021, 6:46 pm

May or the final weekend of April for me.

AV Founder
AV Founder
Posts: 7261
Joined: October 23rd, 2004
Location: SaskaTOON, Canada

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Randall » October 13th, 2021, 10:52 pm

Here in Canada, it's more like July. :)

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 459
Joined: May 24th, 2021

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by GeffreyDrogon » October 15th, 2021, 6:43 pm

If The Lion King was such a huge success at the box office, then why wasn't The Lion King 2 a theatrical sequel? When were theatrical animated film sequels viewed as viable?

User avatar
AV Founder
AV Founder
Posts: 25294
Joined: October 22nd, 2004
Location: London, UK

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by Ben » October 15th, 2021, 7:47 pm

Disney had a no sequel rule, as was Walt's wish so as to keep the originals timeless and untouchable. As a DTV, it didn’t cost as much to make and wasn’t an "official" sequel.

Once Toy Story 2 went from being a DTV to a theatrical release, all bets were off.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 5192
Joined: September 27th, 2007

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by EricJ » October 15th, 2021, 9:10 pm

And once they did start putting Return to Neverland in theaters, for a quick February school-vacation quickie, and liked the taste of it so much, they followed with two more Pooh movies and Jungle Book 2, even Michael Eisner publicly claimed at the stockholders' meeting that they should cut back a tad, as it was hurting the brand of their real theatrical features.

AV Forum Member
AV Forum Member
Posts: 459
Joined: May 24th, 2021

Re: The state and future of animation

Post by GeffreyDrogon » October 15th, 2021, 9:18 pm

Why were most sequels to animated films prior to Toy Story 2 and Shrek 2 direct-to-video films?

Post Reply