Dreamworks’ Puss In Boots (directed by Chris Miller) opens today and I really liked it. Michael O’Sullivan says it best in his review in The Washington Post: “Almost shockingly good. And not just because a lot of you will approach it with lowered expectations.”

It’s visually beautiful, the 3D is actually great and the story was fun and exciting. There is always something going on, every moment seems to be either a funny gag or an action sequence; the whole film mixes fantasy, adventure and humor in a very pleasing way. The only flaw is the carry-over of ugly human character design, already established in the Dreamworks’ Shrek universe. I’ll give them a pass on this, as the film is supposed to connect as a prequel to Shrek. All the new anthropomorphic characters, including Humpty Alexander Dumpty and Kitty Softpaws, are terrific – and picture, on the whole, is absolutely worth a view.

What did you think? Here’s our talkback post and we welcome your point of view. (The comments thread is open only to those who have seen the film – all other comments will be deleted)

MTV revives its commitment to animation with the much ballyhooed revival of Mike Judge’s Beavis and Butt-head and the premiere of David Gordon Green’s Good Vibes.

Can Beavis survive in MTV’s post-Snooky universe? Does Good Vibes hold its own against the animated shows from Fox, Adult Swim and Comedy Central? It’s your turn to let everyone know what you think. (Please only post below if you’ve watched tonight’s shows – we will delete those who haven’t).

Here’s the final version of a trailer we leaked a few months ago, Illumination’s adaptation of Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax:

When it started airing on MTV in 1993, Beavis and Butt-Head was more than just a popular animated series, it was a cultural phenomenon. Its subversive humor centered around two terminally moronic teenagers became a hit with MTV’s viewership, not to mention a lightning rod for controversy and a focal point for discussion on the state of American culture: was the show promoting ignorance or a sly commentary on the inanity of contemporary society? The debate continued throughout the 1990s as Mike Judge’s dimwitted creations rocketed to stardom.

Tonight a new episode of Beavis & Butt-Head will air on MTV for the first time in 14 years. It remains to be seen whether the new incarnation can connect with a snarkier Internet-bred generation, but to mark the occasion, we thought it would be fitting to take a look back at the show’s roots. Cartoon Brew invited the show’s original producer, John Andrews, to write a personal essay recalling his experiences as a key member of the original crew and tell us about the behind-the-scene challenges of producing the show in the early nineties.

Andrews was hired in 1992 to produce MTV’s new series Beavis & Butt-Head and stayed for several years. He co-produced the 1996 feature Beavis & Butt-Head Do America with Abby Terkuhle. After a subsequent 13-year run at Klasky Csupo, he is now at Six Point Harness running 6 Point Media.

HOW BEAVIS SAVED MY LIFE
by John Andrews

I’m a fan of Mike Judge. In all my years working with animation creators, I have met very few others who have known their own creations with the thoroughness and vision Mike had from the very beginning. This is the true story of how Beavis & Butt-Head found me and changed my life.

* * * * *

As a budding animation producer with a few slightly tamer animation projects to my credit, mostly for PBS, I had the opportunity to jump into the job of producing the animated shorts and music video commentaries that MTV had ordered as the first season of Beavis & Butt-Head. For me this led to a five year run producing the series, co-producing the feature and launching a number of other MTV animated projects. But it all started with a leap onto a train that had already left the station, a series that already had an air-date, first scripts on the table and a whole lot of animation ahead with only a few months to make sense of it all and get something on air.

I moved to New York from Providence, Rhode Island, in 1981 with my rock band The Mundanes. The early eighties recession got the best of us and we all moved on. I settled in to a life of producing graphics and animation for TV and trade shows. I even won a few Emmys for the goofy Monty Python-esque animations that partner Todd Ruff and I put together for a business series called Adam Smith’s Money World in the mid to late eighties. But by 1990, life was getting dull.

Then I got the opportunity to produce the animation for a series called The Creative Spirit for PBS, underwritten by IBM. That series gave me the opportunity to sit at Chuck Jones’ feet for a day long interview/shoot and to meet many terrific animators including Alison Snowden and David Fine, Maciek Albrecht, the folks at Buzzco, Joey Ahlbum and several other denizens of the New York scene.

One relationship I gained out of working on that series was with John Canemaker. He created wonderful animations for the series and became a real friend in that period. One night I went to a party with John, a party thrown in honor of some animators from the film board of Canada. As we stood amidst the crowd, I said to John “Who should I meet in this room?” Without hesitation he answered “Linda Simensky”. Linda was then a part of the development team at Nickelodeon. Linda and I hit it off immediately, finding that we shared a taste for off-beat bands and went to a couple of shows together over the next few months.

* * * * *
With The Creative Spirit under my belt, I was ready for new work opportunities, but following the rule to never appear needy in the job market, when talking to Linda I always stressed how much I enjoyed my job but how open I was to anything else that might come along. Well one day she called to say MTV had signed Mike Judge to create a series called Beavis & Butt-Head based on some shorts Mike had done for Spike & Mike’s Sick and Twisted Festival. MTV’s VP of on-air promotion Abby Terkuhle had called her looking for producing candidates. It sounded good to me. So Linda helped arrange an interview.

The story continues after the jump.
Read the rest of this entry »

Jens Blank’s imaginative new film Don’t Swim After Lunch was created for a traveling art exhibition that started in London and went on to Shanghai and Beijing. Says Blank:

“It’s my take on daydreaming and changing everyday environments into something exciting. It was done over the stretch of 6 weeks grinding away in my room. Live action, Maya, AE, and pfTrack. You can find info on crew, concept art, behind the scenes on my webpage.“

CREDITS
Direction & Design – Jens Blank
Cinematography – David Liddell
Sound Design – Jussi Honka
Music – David Pringle
Additional animation – Bence Varga & Balogh Zsolt

When it rains, it pours. Here’s the spanking new trailers for two 2012 releases. First up, Aardman’s clay animation The Pirates:

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Here’s a sample of the dub for Disney’s new Ghibli film, The Secret World Of Arreity:

Clay animation can be a magical medium when the material is allowed to be itself and not dressed up to look like something else. This is something that animators like Bruce Bickford and David Daniels understood, as does CalArts Experimental grad Allison Schulnik. The pulsating figures in her new short Mound are reminiscent of an earlier Grizzly Bear music video of hers that I posted in 2009, but there’s also some fun new visual concepts, particularly the sequence that begins at the two-minute mark.

CREDITS
Film by Allison Schulnik
Cinematography by Helder K. Sun.
“It’s Raining Today” written by Noel Scott Engel

(Thanks, Jorge Gutierrez)

2011 is not quite done, but that doesn’t stop the studios from promoting its upcoming 2012 fare. Here’s the clever one-sheet (and a new name) for Disney’s latest Studio Ghibli release, The Secret World Of Arriety.

(via The Ghibli Blog)

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The latest from Laika, via Focus Features, Paranorman, opens next August 17th. The teaser poster is quite striking:

(Via Immersed In Movies)

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And finally, for all you Bronies, this scary looking poster spotted on Ventura Blvd (at Barham Blvd.):