Sally Cruikshank's all animated web site breaks new ground in the web animation world. Her two hilarious characters Anita and Whinsey are embarking on a new adventure - the Titanic Two!
This Week's Special Features In AWN's Ever Expanding Store: Six Hilarious X-Rated Animated Films by Tanya Weinberger and "Monica's Untold Story: An Amorality Tale," illustrated by Bill Plympton.
Marketing and communication company Pittard Sullivan (Culver City, CA)engaged SIMEX (Santa Monica, CA) to help create a new full-motion, computeranimated logo to accompany all of King World's programs. The animated logofeatures a star burst animated in Alias|Wavefront PowerAnimator. FromPittard Sullivan, Reid Thompson directed, and Jim Capp and Debra Kaufmanproduced. Nick Bates was the visual effects supervisor and George Mendozawas the executive producer at SimEx Digital Studios.
* Wednesday, March 31. Burbank, California, U.S.A.
Sony Pictures Entertainment's (SPE) new family entertainment division (AF 03/09/99) has announced their first two development deals. The group has acquired worldwide rights to Kevin Eastman's UNDERWHERE, and has signed Eastman to develop an animated children's series based on his popular book. The series follows the adventures of 10-year-old Jacob who travels to UNDERWHERE, a land that exists in the same space as ours but can only be visited by those who possess the gift of imagination.
In between Whoopi Goldberg's off-color humor and Roberto Benigni's exuberant antics, Blue Sky Studios' BUNNY, directed by Chris Wedge, picked up the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film. The award was appropriately presented by the animated insects from Disney/Pixar's A BUG'S LIFE. For the second year in a row, AWN's reader poll predicted the correct Oscar winning film, with 48% of online voters choosing BUNNY. Other animation related Oscars included:
Original Song:THE PRINCE OF EGYPT"When You Believe"Music and Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz
Manga Entertainment has informed Animation World Magazine that they still have a shorts department and are actively looking for animated short films to market and distribute. Since their San Diego animated shorts operation closed down last year, submissions are now being accepted through their central Chicago division. While it is still unclear as to how the shorts will be packaged, films may be sent to:
Manga Entertainment
Attn: Animated Shorts Division
727 N. Hudson #100
Chicago, IL 60610
Major U.S. networks have been bitten by an animation bug and have recently announced a slew of primetime animated series. ABC has worked out a deal with Miramax and Touchstone TV for six episodes of CLERKS, based on director Kevin Smiths 1994 indie film of the same name. Slated for a midseason or fall 2000 launch, the show will be executive-produced by Smith and former SEINFELD supervising producer, Dave Mandel. Like the film, the TV series, only the second ever produced by Miramax, focuses on two young slackers who keep minimum-wage jobs in New Jersey.
Cartoons on the Bay, taking place in Positano, Italy from April 20-24, is currently accepting entries until the February 22 deadline. The festival presents the Pulcinella Awards to animated series of all lengths and animated TV movies. For entry forms, call 39 0637 4983 15, fax 39 0637 3535 21 or visit http://www.raitrade.rai.it/cartoonsbay.
For the first time since the October 2 release of "Antz," there were no animated films in the box office top ten. DreamWorks' THE PRINCE OF EGYPT is still the top animated film placing 11th with $1.9M and a grand total of $93.3M domestically. The film's total worldwide gross to date is $197.8M. Disney/Pixar's A BUG'S LIFE placed 15th with $1.4M bringing its spectacular sum to $155.9M in North America. Worldwide, the insect film has brought in a total of $213.1M and is still going strong. The film's opening in the U.K.
Showtime Network's Internet service Showtime Online has acquired the on-line rights to the futuristic Web-based animated sci-fi strip, "WhirlGirl," in a multi-year pact with WhirlGirl parent Visionary Media LLC. "WhirlGirl" will debut on the site on February 26 with a complete season of 28 new weekly episodes. Chronicling the adventures of a sassy, 21st century superheroine, Kia Cross (a.k.a. WhirlGirl) fights to save the world from an evil, mediatech empire. "WhirlGirl" is Showtime's first original series developed exclusively on the Web.
Batman, Bruce Timm, and animation fans finally have the glossy coffee table book they've always wanted of the caped crusader. Aaron Severson takes a look.
GoodTimes Entertainment announced that "Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Movie," made its Latin American debut this Christmas on Cinecanal and Sky. This marked Cinecanal's first acquisition of an independently-produced animated feature and was the first time Cinecanal ran two versions of a single animated feature: neutral Spanish dubbed version for children and the original, English-language version with Spanish subtitles for family audiences.
GLC Productions, a New York-based production/post-production company, debuts their maiden series venture at this year's show, The Buddy System, an animated Seinfeld meets The Odd Couple. The show, created by Big Nate syndicated cartoonist Lincoln Peirce, centers on the escapades of Buddy and Howie, a pair of sports-crazy twenty-something bachelors. Projected as a weekly half-hour 3D animated series, GLC has produced a 7-minute segment from the premiere viewable at NATPE.
Cubic Enterprises introduces two new children's programs - KoKo, The Pink Rabbit and Koni and the Starjammers. KoKo, two 45-minute clay animated specials follows KoKo and friends as they discover the value of friendship and the simple treasure of life. Koni is a 2D cel sci-fi action/adventure animated series starring Koni, Yena, Icon and Kobot as they bravely battle to retrieve the Hadron Batteries and ultimately, save the Earth in thirteen half-hour episodes.
Four animated series are making their U.S. debuts at NATPE this year through Paris-based Canal+ Distribution/Canal+ Image International: Fennec (52 x 13 minutes), Blazing Dragons (26 x 13 minutes) created by Monty Pythons Terry Jones, The Pirate Family (26 x 26 minutes) and Tristan & Isolde (26 x 26 minutes). Canal+ is also offering the feature-length version of the animated feature, Trouble with Sophie, based on the famous childrens book by the Countess Segur.
Budapest, Hungary-based Varga Studios has been commissioned to co-produce a series of animated projects: Liza (13 x 6 minutes), Wolves, Witches and Giants (13 x 7.5 minutes), Animated Tales of the World, Percy, the Parkkeeper (13 x 7.5 minutes) and Kipper. In addition, Vargas sister company, VARGA tvc Ltd., premiered their first project, Oi! Get Off Our Train, a half-hour animated special produced by the company in association with BBC Bristol, Miramax Films and ZDF, which made its television debut in the U.K.
With the holidays behind and the children back in school, this winter's animated films are slowly starting to head out and make way for spring's batch of films. DreamWorks' "The Prince of Egypt" held eighth place with $3.6M after 6 weeks of release for a grand total of $87.3M. Disney/Pixar's "A Bug's Life" passed the $150M mark placing twelfth with a grand cume of $151.7M. The family-targeted Disney remake of "Mighty Joe Young," featuring extensive CGI work took fourteenth amassing $2.5M and a 5-week sum of $43.4M.
Betty Lou Gerson, the actress behind the distinctive voice of fur-loving villainess Cruella De Vil, in Disney's classic animated feature, "101 Dalmations" (1961), passed away on January 12 at the age of 84.
Wanting to get a piece of the lucrative animated feature pie, Miramax Filmshas announced their acquisition of worldwide distribution rights to theanimated musical fairy tale, "The Adventures of Tom Thumb and Thumbelina."The film is being produced at Hyperion Studios, known for other animatedworks such as "Life with Louie," "Bebe's Kids" and HBO's "Happily EverAfter: Fairy Tales for Every Child." The film features the voices of ElijahWood as Tom Thumb and Jennifer Love Hewitt as Thumbelina.The story
Featured in the Animation World Store this week: The South Park Collection and David Kilmer's Animated Film Collector's Guide...
No question about it. 1998 was the year of animation, thanks to the successful release of so many theatrical features. Evan Backes puts it all in perspective and alerts us to 1999's treats.
An ever-expanding animated prime-time. An increase in CGI programming. Some studios are hiring, others aren't. Some networks are riding high...others aren't. Michael Swanigan looks at 1998's television world and what it could mean for 1999.
Will all those talking animal commercials quiet down in 1999? Chuck McBride discusses the advertising hits of 1998 and what will come of them in 1999.
San Francisco-based (Colossal) Pictures created a new animated Nickelodeon theatrical open, which premiered with Paramounts The Rugrats Movie, and stars Slap D. Pooch, a blue-balloon-nosed dog who was featured in his own short film as part of Nickelodeons Oh Yeah! Cartoons! series. The 16-second open, Slaps Fleck, was directed by Colossals Charlie Canfield, creative directed by George Evelyn, and animated by Chuck Gammage Animation based on a character created by Bill Burnett and designed by Vincent Waller.
