I have a tough time catching up...

[Trazalca]

...and not getting confused with the crazy list of CGI releases
that are desperate to knock Pixar off the top of the hill.

Here's the list for this year ALONE:

Over the Hedge
The Wild
Cars
Ice Age: The Meltdown
Doogal
Hoodwinked
Open Season
The Ant Bully
Monster House
Barnyard
Flushed Away
Happy Feet

I'm very curious to see which ones make it to the Oscars, and which get looked over. And the one I'm most looking forward to from the bunch
is Happy Feet, only because I'm a sucker for a good musical number.

[Minion]

Oh god...do everything you can to go see Over The Hedge. Trust me, it's an excellent movie. Keeps kids entertained, whatever, but it mocks suburbia so perfectly that I just fell in love with it. The fact that it has a great soundtrack from Ben Folds helps as well. Perfect voice acting, really well done animation and just overall, probably one of my favorite CG movies now.

I've heard decent stuff about Hoodwinked, but I havent' bothered with it yet.

Monster House looks like a lot of fun, and my girlfriend wants to see it, so that'll be on the list I'm sure.

I still have no idea about Happy Feet. Probably a little too cutesy cute for me.

The rest of it? Meh...I'll get around to it.

Minion: Surprisingly uninterested in Cars. Probably a DVD watch.

[DarkJedi]

I hear you on the overflow on CGI films on the market, El Trazalca.....but Cars wouldn't be knocking Pixar off the top of the hill because Cars is created by Pixar. :D


Over The Hedge looks hell of fun too.

[omicron]

I defintely want to see OTH. I am also interested in Cars, but not as much. One has Stevel Carrell and Bruce Willis in it, the other has Owen Wilson and Larry the cable guy. Which one do you think I want to see more? :lol:

Omi

[neglet]

Oh god...do everything you can to go see Over The Hedge. Trust me, it's an excellent movie. Keeps kids entertained, whatever, but it mocks suburbia so perfectly that I just fell in love with it. The fact that it has a great soundtrack from Ben Folds helps as well. Perfect voice acting, really well done animation and just overall, probably one of my favorite CG movies now.

I've heard decent stuff about Hoodwinked, but I havent' bothered with it yet.

I loved the Ben Folds tracks in Over the Hedge, but found the plot of the film itself surprisingly uninspired--maybe it was too predictable for me. The animation and voices were excellent, however.

Hoodwinked also has a Ben Folds song in it, and don't be fooled by the cutesy seeming first ten minutes of the film--it's only the setup for a Rashomon-style story, told from four or five viewpoints. The animation wasn't as good as OTH, but I found the film much more entertaining overall.

Ice Age 2 was worth it just for the Warner Bros.-style antics of the squirrel.

Like Minion, in our house we're not too intrigued by Cars, so it may be a rental.

Of the upcoming flicks, Monster House looks most intriguing; Barnyard seems strangely disturbed (maybe it's all the male voices and behavior coming out of cows with udders); and Happy Feet might be a possibility, just because of Robin Williams. Flushed Away could be interesting, CGI coming from Aardman, which is usually known for claymation, but I'm on the fence about it. The rest seem forgettable.

[kah]

Normally I enjoy a good animated flick, but Cars is not one I am going to see. Why? Because it has been commercialized so much it makes me sick. I can't watch tv without seeing an ad for dsl from AT & T or Happy Meals or ANYTHING without seeing those stupid cars. If they want to make commercials using the cars for kids' stuff, fine. Leave our shit alone. See Traz's rant (http://messageboard.cinescape.com/cinescape/forums/showthread.php?t=1357) about adult oriented commercials during cartoons and vice versa.

[Minion]

So the girlfriend and I went to see Cars last night because...well, there isn't a whole hell of a lot out worth seeing right now and we didn't have much else to do. That's seriously the energy level we went into the movie with, so you can assume neither of us was overexcited to see it.

That said however, it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it was a pretty decent animated flick. The whole 'racing' aspect of the movie isn't played up nearly as much as I thought it would be either. The movie is beautiful but it's Pixar so...you know, it's hard not to be amazed by it. Short and sweet rundown:

Pros: Gorgeous animation! They really made a beautiful film and it's one of the best looking Pixar movies (especially in the animation department...the subtle little movements of the characters, etc.). Some really cute and funny moments that are sprinkled generously throughout the movie. Definitely has that "fun factor" going for it, due mostly to the fact that there aren't any real dark characters or overly dark themes. Sticks pretty close to the cute factor. The credits are fun and all the characters themselves have a nice feel to them.

Cons: Unbearably predictable at times. Trust me, there isn't anything new here storywise and hell...your kids might even get bored with that part if they're old enough to care. Can be a little too corny as well, but I expected that. There is also a little musical montage in the middle of the movie that, while it has a point, seems slightly out of place. Mostly because of the music. You have all this racing music and then bam, slowdown country song. Odd.

Oh, the mini-movie at the beginning (One Man Band) was great as well. Short, sweet and funny.

So yeah...not the best film on the block, I preferred Over the Hedge, but at least worth checking out eventually. Not a bad movie, just not perfect by any means.

Minion: KACHOW!

[Cncrman]

Went to see Cars last week with my kids. I have to agree with Minion that it is gorgeous. If you get bored with the characters, look in the background. I loved the fact that the natural scenery in the desert was actually modeled after old car grills and tail fins.

Min's right about it sticking to a fairly predictable storyline, a Pixar formula if you will. Let's break it down, shall we?


Take main character with some sort of attitude problem
Mix in wiser character and/or zany situation and/or life experience or all of the above
Musical montage in the middle (as needed)
Some sort of dramatic moment where main character has to decide between they way they were before and what they have become
Fun credits
and cut, print...thank you


That being said, that has never been one Pixar feature that has not sucessfully made me get choked up near the end. During that "Dramatic moment" I mentioned. Cars included.

Ah damn...I'm choking up right now. *Sniff* When he does that thing...at the race...that you didn't expect...

*Ahem*
Anyway, good movie. I'd watch it again.

[DeathScythe]

You know, considering I'm trying to break into the 3D industry, you'd think I'd, you know, go see these movies.

But I don't.
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.
.
.
.
.
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.
.


...Yeah, I'm going to see Cars this weekend.


I also saw the commercial for Monster House for the first time too. Looks interesting, especially for a supernatural junkie like me. Plus the excellent use of Danny Elfman's Beetlejuice theme in that particular commercial just cinched the deal for me.

[neglet]

At the IMAX showing of Superman returns, I saw three trailers for IMAX 3-D versions of these films. I think Open Season and Ant Bully were two of them (shows how memorable the plots look), and Happy Feet was definitely the third. Maybe I'll see the latter, if Neglet Jr. is interested.

[omicron]

seen some commercials for it. Looks decent. My only question is why the made it look like the Wallace and Gromit claymation(including the English accents) but went CGI instead?

Omi

[neglet]

It's from Aardman Animation, the same British studio who produces the W&G films, so that explains the design.

It's CGI rather than Claymation because there's too much water in the story--it's almost impossible to render liquids in stop-motion. Plus, Aardman wanted to gain more experience in CGI, so it made sense.

(I just wrote a piece on Nick Park, creator of W&G, so I learned a few things. Like Nick Park has never owned a dog, not even as a child!)

[omicron]

thanks Negs, that answers my questions.

Beauty and brains, what a combo. :wink:

Omi

[Strider]

I'm definitely loooking forward to seeing what Aardman has done with Flushed Away. I love the character design, and I'm curious to see if the magic they could weave with clay translates into the CGI realm.