Roy E. Disney Dies at 79; Rejuvenated Animation

Roy E. Disney, who helped revitalize the famed animation division of the company founded by his uncle, Walt Disney, and who at times publicly feuded with top Disney executives, died on Wednesday in Newport Beach, Calif. He was 79.

His death, at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian, was caused by stomach cancer, a spokeswoman for the Walt Disney Company said. Mr. Disney, who had homes in Newport Beach and the Toluca Lake district of Los Angeles, was the last member of the Disney family to work at the entertainment conglomerate built by his uncle and his father, Roy O. Disney.

As a boy the younger Roy would play in the halls of his uncle’s studio, where animators often used him as a test audience as they toiled on movies like “Pinocchio.” As an adult he helped bring the animation studio back from the brink, overseeing a creative renaissance that led to “The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King.”

But the soft-spoken Mr. Disney was primarily known for a willingness to question the company’s top managers, aggressively and publicly, when he felt they were mishandling the family empire. Some people in the company referred to him as its real-life Jiminy Cricket: a living conscience who was at times intensely disliked by management for speaking out.

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Rs 120-cr 3D animation film on The Jungle Book

The mischievous ‘Mowgli’ and his jungle friends, including his bear companion ‘Baloo’, will once again be reincarnated on the big screen.

But this time, in a high-definition stereoscopic 3D (with wearable glasses for viewing pleasure) animated feature-film format.

Hyderabad-based animation, gaming and entertainment company DQ Entertainment International, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the over Rs 200-crore AIM-listed DQ Entertainment Plc, is producing the film which is an adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's novel The Jungle Book, with a budget of ¤18 million (approximately Rs 120 crore).

“Currently, two noted writers are working on the initial script treatment in London for the feature film. And we are in the process of roping in three distributors — one each in the US, Europe and Asia — to cover all the territories worldwide. The film will begin production in September 2010 and will be ready for a global theatrical release by the end of 2011,” Tapaas Chakravarti, chairman and chief executive officer of the DQE Group, told Business Standard.

About 150 of DQE’s animation experts, including 10 from its Paris office, will work non-stop for nearly 18 months for the 90-minute film, while the entire post-production work will be done at DQE's Ireland facility, he added.

The movie will unfold interesting tales of Mowgli, the man cub, raised by a pack of wolves in the tropical jungle of Seeonee.

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3D films: the next film revolution?

They've been the next big thing for the past 50 years, but 3D films have finally come of age. Just the thing to get bums on seats, says Chris Evans

Cinema has already been through two major revolutions in its relatively short life. First there was the transition from silent to talkie, then from black and white to colour. Now Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO of DreamWorks Animation, believes "3D is the next revolution in the cinema-going experience".

A bold statement, and one tinged with a distinct bias as DreamWorks is one of several Hollywood studios set to release their forthcoming animation projects in the new, digitised 3D format. Titles set to hit our screens include Monsters vs Aliens (2009), A Christmas Carol (2009), Toy Story 3 (2010), Shrek Goes Fourth (2010), and Avatar, due for release in December next year, which is hotly tipped to be the turning point in the 3D revolution.

It is important to point out that 3D is, of course, nothing new. It was first experimented with back in the 1950s and Imax cinemas have been showing films in 3D for the past 30 years. But now, with the advent of digital 3D technology being installed in cinemas worldwide, and the fact that the choice of films in 3D is not only broader but much better, audiences need only head to a multiplex and put on the glasses to immerse themselves in what is proving to be a wholly new way to enjoy the latest studio blockbuster.

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DreamWorks Animation predicts all films will be 3D

During the International Broadcasting Conference (IBC) held in Amsterdam over the weekend, DreamWorks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg made a bold prediction. He believes that in the future all movies will be filmed in 3D, but didn’t give any time frame past , “a reasonable period of time”.

The prediction was fitting as the speech he gave was actually broadcast in high-definition 3D with viewers wearing glasses to experience the full effect. The transmission was a first; beaming Katzenberg’s speech from Los Angeles to the attendees in Amsterdam on Sunday. It was made possible through the use of 3Ality Digital image capture and transmission tech, combined with a HD satellite link provided by Arqiva.

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Amedia eyes first 3-D animated release

MOSCOW -- Russian TV and movie production company Amedia said it expects to release Russia's first 3-D animated film in late 2008 or early 2009, the Russian business newspaper RBC Daily reported Monday.

Amedia's general director, Alexei Volin, told RBC that the visual side of the movie is expected to be completed by August, but he wouldn't discuss the budget or the title, saying the latter "has not yet been fixed."

This is Amedia's second stab at 3-D animation. Last year, it announced the $3 million project "Krakatuk," but the fate of that project remains unclear, having missed its tentative October 2007 Russian release date.

However, observers say that 3-D animation remains a promising area for the Russian film industry, where the niche of "family movies" has yet to be fully exploited

Source : http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/