Imagine my surprise when I spotted this (photo above) on the marquee of the El Capitan Theatre today. Perhaps it was well known in Disney fan circles, but I hadn’t heard anything about a theatrical release of the 3D version of Beauty and The Beast until I walked by the theatre this morning. I saw no TV or newspaper advertising about it (and I still read newspapers).

It’s playing for two weeks at the El Cap, four times each day 10:45am‎, ‎2:00‎, ‎4:45,‎ 7:30pm ‎and since I do not own a 3D Hi-Def TV, I definitely plan to check out the “meticulously dimensionalized” version on the big screen this weekend. A 3D version of The Lion King opens at the El Cap (and nationwide) on September 16th. Both films will be on sale in 3D Blu-Ray editions on October 4th.

As previously reported, Huston Huddleston has been posting the lost songs composed and demos recorded by his father, Floyd, primarily for Disney features The Aristocats and The Rescuers. We’ve been linking to many of them on our CB Facebook page. Here’s one of particular note, sung and written by Floyd Huddleston himself, recorded at Disney Studios in Burbank 1974. This was an early version of the theme song of the Rescue Aid Society in The Rescuers.

My next Animation Tuesday presentation at the Cinefamily (The Silent Movie Theatre) in Los Angeles is a curated compilation of trippy 40s and 50s Technicolor educational, industrial and instructional films from the Golden Age of Hollywood Cartoons! No boring classroom lessons here; these are highly entertaining examples of animation from the greatest talents in the field. From Disney, you’ll witness the rarely seen — by men, at least — Kotex-sponsored The Story of Menstruation (1946), from UPA we’ll screen both Bill Hurtz’ Man Alive (1951) and Abe Levitow’s Inside Magoo (1959), two theatrical shorts that explore the dangers of cancer.

The highlight of the evening will be a 35mm Technicolor screening of John Sutherland’s 50s-design masterpiece Rhapsody Of Steel (1959, image above) with animation by Irv Spence and Emery Hawkins, backgrounds by Eyvind Earle, art direction by Maurice Noble and Victor Haboush, and music by Dimitri Tiomkin. And that’s not all – there will be plenty of other unique animated surprises I can’t announce yet! Plus, the program will be preceded by a big-screen showing of all ten selections in Cartoon Brew’s 2011 Student Festival (We’ll be doing a separate post soon about this special showing). Advance tickets on sale now. Don’t miss this one-of-a-kind animation event!

I always hated Captain Planet, but if it were this cool back then I would have watched it more often. From Funny or Die, Don Cheadle takes Captain Planet in a new direction:

For the Pink Panther fanatic who has everything…

When the Pink Panther theatrical shorts were first broadcast on NBC’s Saturday Morning in 1969, DePatie Freleng created a live-action opening title segment (see below) using a customized “Panthermobile“, designed by Jay Ohrberg. Now, the original car is now being offered for sale via an online auction from September 4th through October 14th. I was never sure what they thought creating such a vehicle would do for the Pink Panther – other than create publicity at car shows around the world – but it’s a pretty cool car. If you got the green (and the pink) for it, a once in a lifetime opportunity could be yours.

(Thanks, Charles Brubaker)

Produced by Luc Besson, Bibo Bergeron’s A Monster In Paris looks gorgeous… but the story, about a giant singing flea, seems a bit slight. Hope I’m wrong. It opens in France in October. No U.S. distributor or release date yet, but here’s the English language trailer: