Writer/producer/director/co-editor Leslie Iwerks, granddaughter of Ub Iwerks (SFX Oscar-winner, The Birds(1964)), submitted this doco of hers for Oscar consideration too, but The Pixar Story received only Emmy and American Cinema Editors award nominations.
Such oversights don't prevent this delicious voyage from Mickey to Ratatouille(2007) from also being an emotive, ennobling ride--much as Pixar Treks usually are. Along the way we discover that animation is a labour of love for keen students, the best of whom go to CalArts to be lectured by Disney's retired artists, who themselves retain a student's attitude despite being lifelong pros. And when the lecturers went home, we're told the animation students taught each other--just like computer scientists do. I know that excitement well.
It dawns on us that animation really is a me-generation- and recession-busting globaliser of minds.
Back in 2004-5, according to this "lucid" ('Bottom Line: the lucid and entertaining story behind Pixar's success', Kirk Honeycutt, THR, 9 Oct 2007) feature documentary, the traditional animation industry was being dismantled. Established and talented 2D animators were being laid off in an industry contraction blamed on 3D and Pixar specifically. Ed Catmull goes to great lengths on camera to emphasize how being scapegoated hurt them. After all, they were just animators trying to survive in a hostile business environment.
The trades kept declaring that 'Animators draw less as computers tooning up' (Greg Reifsteck), and '3D success is flattening traditionally animated pix' (THR's Carl Diorio). Of course by then Pixar had been in a production deal with Disney Studios, which distributed their product, for 14yrs. Perhaps to buy time for their own 2D animators, Disney is alleged to have decided to source Pixar's blockbusters to create direct-to-video 2D sequels without any Pixar input. The decision would prove contentious since Pixar creators would not abandon their "children" (to career-killing sequelitis). A mighty battle over creative control allegedly ensued within the Pixar/Mouse House.
Eventually, 6yrs after the alleged Toy Story2(1999) near-calamity, there was a massive Disney shake-up instead.
According to Iwerks' roadmap, the Mouse House had also been struggling with an industry-wide Fear of the Computer for some time, which first resulted in their early loss of John Lasseter in 1984. They had expected 3D to be cheaper than 2D! This industry war may have lasted 30+yrs, but venerable Disney artist Joe Grant, speaking just months prior to his death in 2005, makes the astonishing admission that in losing Lasseter, Disney was set to lose their heir to Walt.
Lasseter had been 3D-animating his 'Brave Little Toaster' at Disney during the early 1980s, while concurrently, Pixar co-founders Alvy Ray Smith and Ed Catmull were creating the famous high-quality early CGI "Genesis Project" clip for STII-The Wrath of Khan(1983) at ILM. Interestingly, Star Trek performed the same universal-appeal humanist function then that Pixar does today.
Iwerks' documentary reveals that during that momentous year at a computer graphics conference, Catmull, having heard SOME of Lasseter's tale of woe, instantly snapped him up post-Disney as the new animation hire for the fledgling CGI company that George Lucas had permitted them to start up. The Pixar Story also claims that for two decades afterwards, Disney kept trying to tempt Lasseter back, but he always remained more committed to Pixar.
In the late 1990s Disney finally over-invested in the lukewarm 2D/3D actioner Treasure Planet(2002), and LOST around $100M for their Feature Animation division. This was almost certainly the cause of the subsequent organisational shake-up in late 2005, when Michael Eisner was replaced by Bob Iger as head of Disney. And with that, The Pixar Story informs us, the entire mood, prospects, and history of Pixar changed.
3D's success is arguably just a natural evolution; if it wins the final look of cinema feature animation, so what? Conversely, many feel much more comfortable with 2D full-frame for TV weekly comedies, which according to Seth MacFarlane of Family Guy fame, is a much more intimate format for his type of entertainment.
As industry insiders know, 2D is still the staple of animation and the bulk of the business--it's just not sexy. 2D is also vital to 3D itself pre-rendering, so plenty of animation jobs remain at as many studios as are able to offer great UNIVERSAL STORYTELLING. Roy Disney (Walt's nephew) confirms this in the home stretch of Iwerks' triumph.
But more than that, enchanting storytelling perhaps needs to be rarer/harder to do than the annual supply of 3D multiplex features currently proposed. Even 3D's over-reliance on animal-allegories/fables can prove fatal. Audiences are already reaching saturation point from their inundation by the big three 3D studios. This could prove just as devastating as Disney's "perfectionist" movement-over-characterisation had become to 2D. Under no circumstances should anybody again attempt a Meet Dave(2007)-like stylistic debauchery of contemporary cultural cool.
Thankfully, Iwerks reveals Pixar artists as remaining "hungry" after a decade-and-a-half of financial success. Equally, they're well aware of their high regard not only by the public at large, but among 2D traditional animators, recently giving their "9 Old Men"/CalArts lecturers Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas animated cameos within The Incredibles(2005).
The Pixar Story also features welcome live-action cameos by the two saddest quick-succession losses to animation in 2005: Joe Grant (Fantasia(1940), Dumbo(1941)--heart attack); and Joe Ranft (our beloved Heimlich--car accident). Tragically neither saw Iwerks' doco, 7yrs in the making, completed.
This often gobsmacking, educational and deeply moving feature documentary finally concludes with a moving end credit sequence full of quiet dignity showcasing the enormous workloads underpinning wireframes. The end crawl is overlain by a powerfully Beatlesesque instrumental, "Modern Inventions", by The Submarines. It sells the whole message of 3D, willing us to fall in love with the entire precept of animation--and certainly with the Pixar folks at Emeryville, CA.
For everything else I had to say about The Pixar Story(2007), consult Honeycutt's review referenced earlier.(10/10)
Such oversights don't prevent this delicious voyage from Mickey to Ratatouille(2007) from also being an emotive, ennobling ride--much as Pixar Treks usually are. Along the way we discover that animation is a labour of love for keen students, the best of whom go to CalArts to be lectured by Disney's retired artists, who themselves retain a student's attitude despite being lifelong pros. And when the lecturers went home, we're told the animation students taught each other--just like computer scientists do. I know that excitement well.
It dawns on us that animation really is a me-generation- and recession-busting globaliser of minds.
Back in 2004-5, according to this "lucid" ('Bottom Line: the lucid and entertaining story behind Pixar's success', Kirk Honeycutt, THR, 9 Oct 2007) feature documentary, the traditional animation industry was being dismantled. Established and talented 2D animators were being laid off in an industry contraction blamed on 3D and Pixar specifically. Ed Catmull goes to great lengths on camera to emphasize how being scapegoated hurt them. After all, they were just animators trying to survive in a hostile business environment.
The trades kept declaring that 'Animators draw less as computers tooning up' (Greg Reifsteck), and '3D success is flattening traditionally animated pix' (THR's Carl Diorio). Of course by then Pixar had been in a production deal with Disney Studios, which distributed their product, for 14yrs. Perhaps to buy time for their own 2D animators, Disney is alleged to have decided to source Pixar's blockbusters to create direct-to-video 2D sequels without any Pixar input. The decision would prove contentious since Pixar creators would not abandon their "children" (to career-killing sequelitis). A mighty battle over creative control allegedly ensued within the Pixar/Mouse House.
Eventually, 6yrs after the alleged Toy Story2(1999) near-calamity, there was a massive Disney shake-up instead.
According to Iwerks' roadmap, the Mouse House had also been struggling with an industry-wide Fear of the Computer for some time, which first resulted in their early loss of John Lasseter in 1984. They had expected 3D to be cheaper than 2D! This industry war may have lasted 30+yrs, but venerable Disney artist Joe Grant, speaking just months prior to his death in 2005, makes the astonishing admission that in losing Lasseter, Disney was set to lose their heir to Walt.
Lasseter had been 3D-animating his 'Brave Little Toaster' at Disney during the early 1980s, while concurrently, Pixar co-founders Alvy Ray Smith and Ed Catmull were creating the famous high-quality early CGI "Genesis Project" clip for STII-The Wrath of Khan(1983) at ILM. Interestingly, Star Trek performed the same universal-appeal humanist function then that Pixar does today.
Iwerks' documentary reveals that during that momentous year at a computer graphics conference, Catmull, having heard SOME of Lasseter's tale of woe, instantly snapped him up post-Disney as the new animation hire for the fledgling CGI company that George Lucas had permitted them to start up. The Pixar Story also claims that for two decades afterwards, Disney kept trying to tempt Lasseter back, but he always remained more committed to Pixar.
In the late 1990s Disney finally over-invested in the lukewarm 2D/3D actioner Treasure Planet(2002), and LOST around $100M for their Feature Animation division. This was almost certainly the cause of the subsequent organisational shake-up in late 2005, when Michael Eisner was replaced by Bob Iger as head of Disney. And with that, The Pixar Story informs us, the entire mood, prospects, and history of Pixar changed.
3D's success is arguably just a natural evolution; if it wins the final look of cinema feature animation, so what? Conversely, many feel much more comfortable with 2D full-frame for TV weekly comedies, which according to Seth MacFarlane of Family Guy fame, is a much more intimate format for his type of entertainment.
As industry insiders know, 2D is still the staple of animation and the bulk of the business--it's just not sexy. 2D is also vital to 3D itself pre-rendering, so plenty of animation jobs remain at as many studios as are able to offer great UNIVERSAL STORYTELLING. Roy Disney (Walt's nephew) confirms this in the home stretch of Iwerks' triumph.
But more than that, enchanting storytelling perhaps needs to be rarer/harder to do than the annual supply of 3D multiplex features currently proposed. Even 3D's over-reliance on animal-allegories/fables can prove fatal. Audiences are already reaching saturation point from their inundation by the big three 3D studios. This could prove just as devastating as Disney's "perfectionist" movement-over-characterisation had become to 2D. Under no circumstances should anybody again attempt a Meet Dave(2007)-like stylistic debauchery of contemporary cultural cool.
Thankfully, Iwerks reveals Pixar artists as remaining "hungry" after a decade-and-a-half of financial success. Equally, they're well aware of their high regard not only by the public at large, but among 2D traditional animators, recently giving their "9 Old Men"/CalArts lecturers Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas animated cameos within The Incredibles(2005).
The Pixar Story also features welcome live-action cameos by the two saddest quick-succession losses to animation in 2005: Joe Grant (Fantasia(1940), Dumbo(1941)--heart attack); and Joe Ranft (our beloved Heimlich--car accident). Tragically neither saw Iwerks' doco, 7yrs in the making, completed.
This often gobsmacking, educational and deeply moving feature documentary finally concludes with a moving end credit sequence full of quiet dignity showcasing the enormous workloads underpinning wireframes. The end crawl is overlain by a powerfully Beatlesesque instrumental, "Modern Inventions", by The Submarines. It sells the whole message of 3D, willing us to fall in love with the entire precept of animation--and certainly with the Pixar folks at Emeryville, CA.
For everything else I had to say about The Pixar Story(2007), consult Honeycutt's review referenced earlier.(10/10)