Disney And Tim Burton’s Hybrid ‘Dumbo’ Remake Gets A New Trailer

The barrage of new film studio trailers continues today with a new look at Tim Burton’s live-action/cg hybrid Dumbo, a remake of the 1941 Disney hand-drawn film.

With a running time of 64 minutes, the original film was Walt Disney’s shortest animated feature, so Burton and writer Ehren Kruger (Ghost in the Shell, Scream 3, The Ring) had their work cut out. They’ve flesh out the world with an assortment of new characters and plot points to justify the remake, which if anything like other recent Disney remakes, should be around twice as long as the first Dumbo’s runtime.

Here’s what they came up with:

Circus owner Max Medici (Danny DeVito) enlists former star Holt Farrier (Colin Farrell) and his children Milly (Nico Parker) and Joe (Finley Hobbins) to care for a newborn elephant whose oversized ears make him a laughingstock in an already struggling circus. But when they discover that Dumbo can fly, the circus makes an incredible comeback, attracting persuasive entrepreneur V.A. Vandevere (Michael Keaton), who recruits the peculiar pachyderm for his newest, larger-than-life entertainment venture, Dreamland. Dumbo soars to new heights alongside a charming and spectacular aerial artist, Colette Marchant (Eva Green), until Holt learns that beneath its shiny veneer, Dreamland is full of dark secrets.

Much like the new story, the film’s graphic sensibility has also morphed in a significant way, from the direct graphic appeal of the original 2d animation to soulless late-Burton rococo. Draining out all the fun and entertainment from an animated classic worked well financially for Disney’s Jungle Book remake and there’s no reason to see why the studio can’t make it work again for Dumbo.

Production design and costume design are overseen by frequent Burton collaborators Rick Heinrichs and Colleen Atwood, respectively. Ben Davis is the cinematographer and Danny Elfman provides the music.

The vfx shops handling the digital creations, including the cg title character, are MPC, Framestore, Rodeo FX, Rise, and Rising Sun Pictures, under production vfx supervisor Richard Stammers.

Disney will release Dumbo in U.S. theaters on March 29, 2019.