You've heard of the erotic bestseller 50 Shades of Grey. You may have even read a steamy passage or two here and there. But why torture yourself by actually reading E.L. James' florid-melodramatic prose when one animated fan trailer gives you all the essential need-to-knows — including the best-worst cringe-inducing scene of the book?
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Video games have inspired many a movie in the post-Atari age, but Disney's CG-animated November adventure Wreck-It Ralph puts a spin on things: It follows an 8-bit villain named Wreck-It Ralph (voiced by John C. Reilly) who escapes the confines of his video game and journeys through the arcade to prove he's got what it takes to be a hero. As such, the early art work has been retro-tastic, and this week's new teaser poster is no different. Take a gander and get ready to explain to the iPhone-toting, Tweet-happy kiddies what "8-bit" means.
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First things first: Rise of the Guardians is an animated adventure, but it's not a sequel to that owl movie. I know, it's very confusing. What's more, it's about Santa Claus — a brawny, tatted-up Santa who pulls a Sam Jackson and assembles a superteam to fight evil and protect the children of the world. The other fantasy heroes called to duty? The Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and the Sandman. It's pretty much The Avengers for kids, only I'm willing to bet it'll have a better soundtrack. Hey-oh!
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Last summer’s Cars 2 marked a notable footnote in the history of Pixar Animation, just not a good one; despite opening to the studio’s sixth-highest worldwide take to date, the sequel to 2006’s Cars earned middling reviews, prompted critics to deem it a commercial cash-grab, and eventually – maybe most shockingly, given the studio's track record – became the first Pixar film not to nab an Oscar nod for Best Animated Feature since the category was inaugurated. Could it be, as Pixar producer Lindsey Collins suggests, that Cars 2 was Oscar-snubbed because of anti-Pixar backlash?
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We’ve come to the point where hand-drawn animation almost seems like a forgotten art, lost in the gaudy shuffle of motion-capture slickness a la The Adventures of Tintin and the sleek technical sophistication of pictures like Rango and Kung-Fu Panda 2. That’s why it’s such a glorious relief to greet the arrival of an old-school -– but very grown-up -- animated picture like Fernando Trueba, Javier Mariscal and Tono Errando’s Chico & Rita, a romance that opens in late-1940s Cuba and uses a thumbnail history of midcentury Latin jazz as its backdrop.
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"We must treat these dog characters with the same respect we show human characters... no condescension, no looking down, no breaking character for the sake of a gag." And that, my friends, is part of the reason why Walt Disney's legacy on film has stood the test of time. After the jump, find deleted scenes and a nifty video culling notes from Disney's story meetings with collaborators on 1955's Lady and the Tramp.
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From Transformers to G.I. Joe to this weekend's The Smurfs, children of the '80s have lost many a Saturday morning cartoon memory to the cash-grabbing clutches of the Hollywood remake machine. Plenty more are being developed into shiny, CG-smooth reboots as we speak. So let's take a moment and plea, for the sake of those that remain, that these nine beloved, totally '80s children's properties be left where they belong: In our fuzzy, warm past -- safe in the glow of yesteryear.
What does Kung Fu Panda 2 have to do with King of the Hill, Midnight Run, and Animal House? Ask screenwriters Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger, who co-scripted and co-produced the Oscar-nominated 2008 global hit Kung Fu Panda and its sequel, in theaters this weekend. After working their way up the ranks with TV comedy gigs, the duo has emerged one of DreamWorks Animation's strongest writing teams -- and to think, it all started with a stuffy office job in Boston...
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