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Whether it's the possibility of losing distribution rights to DreamWorks Animation movies when the contract expires in 2012 or because of the critical and financial success of its first fully owned CGI animated movie, Rango, Paramount Pictures has announced via press release that it is launching an in-house animation division, Paramount Animation. The Viacom subsidiary plans to release one CGI animated movie per year starting in 2014, with the budget per movie in the $100 million range, a moderate amount by today's standards (Rango cost $135 million while Shrek Forever After cost $165 million and Cars 2 cost $200 million). Paramount did not announce any upcoming titles, but the release did state that "a key piece" of its development plan will be "titles under the label of Viacom's Nickelodeon."
more about Paramount Animation >> Posted 07.07.11 by BrentJS -
Today's Challenge: The Adjustment Bureau and Rango both open nationwide today. Can you link their leading men?
Our first Facebook movie game, ClusterFlick, plays off that old "six degrees of separation" theory — you know, the one that has a certain Kevin at the center of the Hollywood universe. It's easy to play, but not so easy to win. The goal is to use the major cast of movies to get from Point A to Point B in the smallest number of moves.
Play ClusterFlick >>
Posted 03.04.11 by reelz -
Reviews for Rango are all over the map, some calling it "a miracle," others calling it "soulless."
"...some kind of a miracle: An animated comedy for smart moviegoers, wonderfully made, great to look at, wickedly satirical, and (gasp!) filmed in glorious 2-D."
— Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times"Rango is an absolutely wonderful film that almost inexplicably blends adventure with introspection, a sumptuous Western with surrealist tendencies about the infuriating but ultimately rewarding quest for identity."
— Jason McKiernan, filmcritic.com"...turns an assembly line of classic western themes and iconography into a bustlingly fresh genre ecosystem."
— Glenn Heath Jr., Slant Magazine"I don't know what this surreal splash of trippy performance art is exactly, but a kiddie cartoon about good, bad and ugly desert critters dressed as cowboys and townsfolk doesn't cut it."
— Peter Travers, Rolling Stone"...for all its genre-bending cleverness and technical dexterity, Rango's overstuffed plot fails to consistently blend its brainy pretensions with its chase-and-slapstick family-film obligations."
— Nick Schager, LA Weekly"It is, for what it is, a work of considerable care and craft. And it's completely soulless."
— Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune -
A nearly seven-minute international (don't worry, it's not dubbed) preview clip from director Gore Verbinski's (Pirates of the Caribbean) new CG-animated feature, Rango, has appeared online in advance of Friday's nationwide opening. Written by John Logan (Gladiator) from an idea conceived by Verbinski and James Ward Byrkit, Rango tells the story of a domesticated chameleon (voiced by Johnny Depp) who accidentally winds up in the dusty—and deadly—desert town of Dirt and reinvents himself as the seven-with-one-bullet gunslinger known simply as Rango.
watch the extended preview clip >> Posted 03.02.11 by BrentJS -
On the heels of its Friday premiere, Paramount just released a three-minute clip of the animated film Rango showing a cat-and-mouse chase between a chameleon (voiced by Johnny Depp) and a hawk.
Rango marks the first CGI animated flick for F/X powerhouse Industrial Light and Magic. After this weekend, we'll see if Pixar should be shaking in its wooden cowboy boots. From this clip, it seems ILM is giving Pixar at least a run for its money.
watch the new clip >> Posted 03.01.11 by reelz -
A new preview clip has debuted online for director Gore Verbinski's CG-animated, "emotion-captured" feature, Rango, which stars Johnny Depp as a chameleon who finds himself an unlikely hero in the tiny, desert town of Dirt. Verbinski has described Rango as "a thespian in search of an audience," an apt description for the latest clip, which sees Rango attempt to lead a posse through the desert.
watch the clip >> Posted 02.16.11 by Ryan -
At the rate we're going, you won't even have to watch Super Bowl XLV to see all of the great movie TV spots that will fill the gaps between the Packers-Steelers action (or, you can watch the game, but now you can grab snacks and use the restroom during the commercial breaks instead of staying glued to the tube). We've already seen full or partial TV spots for Kung Fu Panda: The Kaboom of Doom, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and Drive Angry, now we have sneak peeks at three more movie TV spots that will air during the big game.
MORE >> Posted 02.05.11 by BrentJS -
Anti Records has released online the full theme song from director Gore Verbinski's (Pirates of the Caribbean) new CG-animated feature, Rango, performed by three-time Grammy Award-winning band Los Lobos. Written by John Logan (Gladiator) from an idea conceived by Verbinski and James Ward Byrkit, Rango tells the story of a pet chameleon (voiced by Johnny Depp) who accidentally winds up in the lawless, dusty desert town of Dirt. Welcomed by the beleaguered denizens as a savior, Rango is happy to play the role of sheriff...until real trouble arrives in town. Additional celebrity voices include Abigail Breslin, Ray Winstone, Harry Dean Stanton, and Timothy Olyphant.
listen to the theme song from Rango >> Posted 02.03.11 by BrentJS -
Director Gore Verbinski shed some light on his new CG-animated feature, Rango, back in July by explaining that the plot centers around a pet chameleon who is "a thespian in search of an audience" who finds himself in a desert town "hungry for a hero." He also introduced the unique filmmaking process he dubbed "emotion capture," which he said encourges "a kinetic, raw spark to the audio track" not found in typical, "manufactured" animated features. Now, a new B-roll featurette for the movie has been released that offers a hilarious look at "emotion capture" in action as title star Johnny Depp, Isla Fisher, Bill Nighy and others act out the scenes that will later be animated.
watch the new featurette >> Posted 12.24.10 by BrentJS -
The initial teaser trailer for director Gore Verbinski's CG-animated Rango wasn't too revealing, leaving viewers scratching their heads over what the movie was about. The second trailer shows the chameleon Rango (voiced by Johnny Depp) out in the desert, clearly unfamiliar with the environment. Verbinski explained in July that Rango is a pet chameleon "in search of an audience" which he finds in the small town of Dirt, which the director said is "really hungry for a hero, and they get the great pretender." That aspect is in full display in the second trailer, which shows Rango channeling Clint Eastwood to become the town's protector from the area's natural predators.
watch the trailer >> Posted 12.14.10 by Ryan