Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The Next From Portland

The stop-motion studio of the Northwest plans to stay in the animation game.

Laika, the Portland-based animation company behind 2009's Coraline, has optioned Goblins, an upcoming children's book by Philip Reeve, and has attached Mark Gustafson, the animation director of Fantastic Mr. Fox, to helm the adaptation.

Gustafson, as reports go, didn't have an easy time of it on Fantastic Mr. Fox with the first-time stop motion director:

"[Wes Anderson was] keeping his distance from the set and directing via e-mail, sending in his favorite DVDs to give an impression of what he'd like to see."

Directing by e-mail? Kind of a new way to goose performances. FF grossed something around $46 million, so I doubt the method will be used again.

My bet is that Mr. Gustafson won't be at his computer during Goblins, reading electronic messages. My bet is he's through with that, since Wes Anderson won't be involved with the production.

5 comments:

Kevin Williams said...

Directing by e-mail might not be the most effective method, but it certainly worked for FMF. Great movie!

Mesterius said...

I agree, Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox was wonderful! I don't care how much/little it grossed... Andersen's style of directing worked!

Chris Sobieniak said...

Still seems pathetic since it's simply "phoning it in" no matter how you put it.

Anonymous said...

jesture says:Hey you know what`s scary. At midnight, you hear tapping on the window, you open the curtains and saw a big ugly green goblin looking at you and it said something to you.

Anonymous said...

that horrible mr. fox children's cartoon flopped big time, and is one of the worst cartoons ever made.

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