Animation appears to be playing a key role in Disney’s award show push, as its latest “For Your Consideration” website, provided under the Buena Vista Pictures banner, contains spots for The Chronicles of Narnia, Chicken Little, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Pooh’s Heffalump Movie. Full songs from Narnia (“Wunderkind” and “Can’t Take It In”), Chicken Little […]

Releasing a plethora of praise, Coming Soon reviews the Toy Story 2 Special Edition DVD, due for release on December 26th. Providing scores of 10/10 for the film itself and 9/10 for the DVD’s extras, the site summarizes its thoughts on the package with, “Overall, if you’re a Pixar or Toy Story fan, this is […]

Hollywood.com indicates that publicist Ivy ‘Supersonic’ Silberstein still insists she created the character of Scrat, the loveable acorn-adoring animal from Fox/Blue Sky’s Ice Age movies. Continuing her fight for recognition, Silberstein has plastered posters over New York City and Los Angeles, asking folks to visit Scrat.com for her side of the story.

According to The Mercury, via The Big Cartoon Database, Warner Bros. and the government of the Australian state of Tasmania are having “closed-door talks” this week, in an effort to bring hope to the endangered Tasmanian devil. The conversations concern an agreement that could bring publicity and funding for research of the facial tumor threatening […]

On February 28, 2006, The Real Ghostbusters will arrive in stores. However, the animated series will be released in DVD volumes of random episodes, rather than season sets. DVDtoons has the episode listings for those volumes, featuring: Volume 1: Catch Me If You Can (“Night Game,” “Lost and Foundry,” “Bird of Kildarby,” and “Killerwatt”), Volume […]

Around 250 original pictures from such Disney classics as Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Fantasia have been discovered at a warehouse in Chiba University, reports Kyodo News, via Yahoo! Asia. Including celluloid and background images, along with sketches, the pictures were donated by the Walt Disney Co. to the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, after […]

Coming soon to your cell phone may be animated avatars that accurately lip-synch, if 3Dmsg, a division of speech technology leader Sensory, has its way. Utilizing the company’s homegrown animation and voice-recognition technologies, the avatars will contain lips that move with the same precision as that of a real person’s, when pronouncing phonemes or parts […]

Latino Review displays a promotional image from Garfield 2, arriving in theaters on June 23, 2006.

IGN FilmForce was in attendance at this year’s Jump Festival, Japan’s annual gala of previews from videogame, manga and anime companies. Found at the festival were another demo and trailer for the anticipated video game Kingdom Hearts II, the presentation of which FilmForce summarizes.

A new article at BackStage reveals that while the pair failed to make it to the list of seven movies eligible for the Best Visual Effects Oscar, both Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride and Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit were among the final fifteen films once considered for the award.

According to Moviehole, Elizabeth Hurley is “in talks” to join her Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery co-star Mike Myers for Shrek 3. The popular ogre’s second sequel will hit theaters on May 18, 2007.

Jim Hill Media points to website names registered by Disney not too long ago, supposing some of the things the Mouse House may have in its future. Projects found in the mix involve: a Tron sequel, the Little Mermaid Broadway show, Le Muppet Show, and the mysterious Adventures of Barf Bag.

Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal, via the Pittsburg Post-Gazette, talk has begun once more that Disney may purchase Pixar. Other ideas being considered are that Disney might buy a minority stake of Pixar, or that Pixar could grant Disney participation in the performance of its future movies in exchange for sequel rights to its […]

In a recent report, the U.S. Institute of Medicine stated that television has been found to strongly influence what children younger than 12 years old eat. Responding to that finding, the panel of scientists recommended that animated characters should promote only healthy food, pointing to the use of characters to push Happy Meals and cookies […]

“Will digital effects ruin Hollywood?” – that is the question asked by Edward Jay Epstein. In his article “The Schizoid Split in Movies,” available at Slate, Epstein ponders whether directors are spending so much time dealing with special effects that they fail to fulfill the film’s live action needs. Likewise, Epstein considers that working with […]

DVDActive has a large version of the cover artwork for the Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit DVD, coming to stores on February 7th. Bonus material for the DVD has yet to be announced.

Cover art for The Land Before Time: 2 Big Dino-Riffic Adventures has been added to DVDActive. Also listed at the site are the DVD set’s bonus features, including: three sing-along songs, “How Do I Find Things?” features, “Ducky’s Deep Sea Discovery,” a “Stars of The Land Before Time IX: Journey to Big Water” feature, and […]

Regarding the new animated series Wolverine and the X-Men, Jason Netter of Kickstart Entertainment remarks to Comics2Film, “We’re just ramping up the writing and the artistic development.” Furthermore, he adds, “Full production will start early next year.” With Netter serving as the series’ producer, Greg Johnson, writer of Marvel’s DTV movies Ultimate Avengers, Ultimate Avengers […]

The official website for the Toy Story 2 Special Edition DVD is now open. Features of the site include info about the DVD, a photo gallery, the film’s trailer, downloads, games, and activities. The Toy Story 2 Special Edition DVD will hit stores on December 26th. Thanks to Justin Williams at the Animated-News Forum for […]

The Venice, California-based Exodus Film Group announced Wednesday that veteran licensing executive Bruce Auerbach has been named president of the company’s new consumer products division, reports The Big Cartoon Database. Reporting to Exodus president John D. Eraklis, Auerbach will manage all licensing and merchandising efforts, including those of Exodus’ animation slate, containing such upcoming flicks […]

The AWN Showcase submits a couple of new pictures from Pixar’s latest short film, One Man Band. Meanwhile, a recent poster for the short may also be found at the Internet Movie Database.

IGN FilmForce examines Scooby-Doo! Unmasked for the Nintendo DS, uncovering what it holds to be a fine, if not spectacular, game. Providing the title with an overall score of 6.5, the site writes, “Scooby-Doo! Unmasked is undone by its lack of polish, making it hard to recommend even though there’s a lot to like. If […]

The newest trailer for next May’s DreamWorks CGI entry Over the Hedge has hit Yahoo! Movies, in both Windows Media and QuickTime versions. Also available at the site is the film’s poster, seen to the right of this news brief.

Once the company’s executive vice president and CFO, Alan Bergman has been promoted as president of Walt Disney Studios, reports bizjournals.com, via Yahoo! Finance. With this new title, Bergman will report directly to Chairman Dick Cook, while overseeing operations for all business units such as Buena Vista Motion Pictures Group, Miramax, and Disney Theatrical Productions. […]

AWN points to Variety, where news comes that Jared Stern has signed a two-year deal to pen both original and existing projects at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Stern made headlines earlier this year, when it was announced that he had sold his idea for Toy Story 3 to Disney, during his time in the Feature […]

The Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit DVD will be released on February 7th, in a single-disc edition, DVDActive reports. Offering the film in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen, the DVD will likewise contain English and French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround tracks for the movie.

DVDActive also has the latest on some re-releases of favorites from Fox Home Entertainment. First up, an Anastasia: Family Fun Edition DVD will arrive in stores on March 14th. The two-disc set will present the film in widescreen and full screen, with an English Dolby Digital 5.1 track. Bonus features for the DVD involve: a […]

Rumor has it that the 1959 television series of Quick Draw McGraw, which also featured segments from Augie Doggie & Doggy Daddy, and Super Snooper & Blabber Mouse, will be riding the next wave of Hanna Barbera Collection sets. The news comes from TV Shows on DVD, which further indicates that a set dedicated to […]

The School of Visual Arts (SVA) has announced the “Which Way Did They Go?” exhibition, to be held Thursday, December 15, 2005 through Saturday, January 21, 2006. The exhibit displays work from five alumni of SVA’s Film, Video & Animation Department: John R. Dilworth, Yvette Kaplan, Alex Kupershmidt, Chris Prynoski and Tom Sito. Drawings, sketches, […]

The Star Tribune reports that the Walt Disney Co. is looking into a unique way of spreading its media content, with the news being discovered from a currently pending patent application. Apparently, Disney is considering a plan such as this: Upon buying a meal at a restaurant, one will receive a portable media player and […]