In anticipation of the New Zealand opening of the second Narnia film, the Dominion Post takes a closer look at the special effects for the film created by local studio Weta.

DreamWorks Animation SKG was downgraded today to sell from neutral at UBS Investment Research, which said the current share price implies domestic box office receipts for future films above the historical average. The share price, driven up by enthusiasm over Kung Fu Panda implies the company will average domestic box office receipts of $202 million […]

Head over to MovieWeb for a vintage clip of Walt Disney doing some magic of his own. This clip is included on the 45th Anniversary Edition DVD of The Sword in the Stone which will be available next Tuesday and also features a Music Magic: The Sherman Brothers featurette along with two classic Disney shorts: […]

The Hollywood Reporter published an interesting article this morning outlining the huge success of Disney merchandise, driven by franchises such as Hannah Montana, High School Musical, Cars and the Disney Princess line. The record $30 billion-plus global revenues expected for this fiscal year represent 5 times the retail sales generated by Warner Bros. Consumer Products […]

DreamWorks unveiled a teaser poster, featuring what looks like visual development art, for its March 2010 feature adaptation of Cressida Cowell’s book How To Train Your Dragon, at the ongoing New York Licensing Show this week. AICN has a snapshot along with an exclusive look at new artwork from DreamWorks’ first stereoscopic 3D film Monsters […]

Suite 101 posted part 1 and 2 of a very interesting, insightful interview with Wall•E director Andrew Stanton.

DreamWorks just launched a fun plane-themed official website of its November sequel. Not much there yet but keep checking back for more over the next couple of months.

The Ultimate Wall•E robot, priced at $179.99 and produced by Thinkway Toys (a company Pixar has been loyal to since its very beginning) and scheduled to ship on September 13, is now available for pre-order online from Toys ‘R’ Us, says Upcoming Pixar. For those with a tight purse, small action figures are also in […]

The Pixar Blog alerts fans that Peter Gabriel’s 6-minute original song Down to Earth, written for Pixar’s latest film, is now available for download from the iTunes Store for 99¢ (U.S. and Canada only).

Disney will stream full-length movies on its Web site for the first time, as part of its “Wonderful World of Disney” series on ABC, says The Hollywood Reporter. The films are scheduled to stream through August. Finding Nemo is available at Disney.com/WWoD through Friday. Monsters, Inc., Haunted Mansion, and Peter Pan also will be available […]

In news that will surprise noone, Jack Black told AAP while promoting Kung Fu Panda in Sydney earlier today that he was confident there would be a follow up: “My eight ball says signs point to yes.” Jack says he’d jump at the chance to be involved if “all the stars are aligned to make […]

According to TheForce.net, Christopher Lee will reprise his role as Count Dooku in the animated feature film Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Interestingly enough, his scenes were apparently animated before he recorded his lines; says a message board member on the actor’s official site: “Mr. Lee has recorded the voice of Count Dooku for this […]

A NY Times article profiling Mac Rebennack, the 67-year-old New Orleans pianist, guitarist and songwriter better known as Dr. John, drops an interesting piece of news: the artist recently recorded Randy Newman’s theme song for Disney’s The Princess and the Frog, about old New Orleans. “They wanted his voice, which is not a bad idea […]

Aardman posted a half dozen new stills from the upcoming Nick Park short, A Matter of Loaf and Death (previously announced under the title Trouble At’ Mill). Production is almost half-way through on the half hour TV project which is expected to debut on BBC1 in the UK later this year.

DreamWorks Animation plans to launch a fairly modest licensing program behind Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa later this fall with a new videogame, toys, apparel and home decor, according to Variety. But the Madagascar film franchise, just like Fox’s Ice Age ‘s, has yet to translate in equally impressive consumer product sales. Hoping to come closer […]

Jeffrey Katzenberg’s studio has been snubbed by the Academy Awards two years in a row now, and only scored house nominations once in the past five years (Wallace & Gromit was the studio’s last win since 2001’s Shrek but an Aardman production). Tough to digest for the only studio in town to be solely dedicated […]

The Sixth Sense director told Coming Soon! about his plans for the live action adaptation of the Nickelodeon cartoon, which is set in a world that’s divided up into elemental factions, two of whom are preparing for war. Asked why he wanted to do the movie, Night explains: “It was just the story. I just […]

Variety reveals exclusively this morning that Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation are bringing a live-action/animated Smurfs project to the big screen, in what will be SPA’s first hybrid film. Sony obtained film rights to the blue-colored characters from Lafig Belgium via Jordan Kerner (Charlotte’s Web), who is producing. David Stem and David Weiss, who […]

Lucky Austin, TX residents should rush to Ain’t It Cool for their chance to see the new Pixar film this Sunday at the Alamo Drafthouse!

IESB recently caught up with Jason Segel about the Muppets film project he is currently developing with Nick Stoller for Walt Disney Pictures. “I actually just turned in my first draft of the MUPPETS and I’m really excited about it. I think we’re bringing them back. Sam the Eagle is definitely in it. Statler and […]

Weekend box office actuals are in and Jeffrey Katzenberg can sigh in relief: DreamWorks Animation’s latest ended up grossing a total of $60,239,130 over the weekend, slightly ahead of Cars‘ $60,119,509 opening two years ago today on June 9, 2006. Adjusted to inflation the Pixar film would still be ahead but who’s counting!

Coming Soon! offers an extended clip of Wall•E, introduced by none other than Pixar voice regular John Ratzenberger.

In another great article, Jim Hill looks at the opening weekend of Kung Fu Panda and reports that while Disney won’t discuss opening numbers for Wall•E, the Mouse House is currently projecting for the new Pixar film to end its theatrical domestic run north of $260 million. Which would reverse the domestic box office trends […]

The team at Disney’s Movie Surfers sat down with writer/director Andrew Stanton to chat about his new film Wall•E. Thanks to Upcoming Pixar for the link.

The Globe and Mail takes a very interesting look this morning at celebrity voices in animated feature films, noting that “em>Kung Fu Panda was in production for four years, but Angelina Jolie spent one week on it and got all the press. Few people know who provided the voices for such classic animated movies as […]

/Film posted on their site the video clip from Pixar’s upcoming film that was shown during ABC’s airing of Finding Nemo this weekend. The scene involves Eve placing Wall•E in a shuttle back to earth. Sigourney Weaver makes a cameo as the voice of the space shuttle computer.

Kids entertainment producer Hit Entertainment will produce the next series of Bob the Builder and Thomas & Friends in CGI, says C21 Media. Thomas will be reworked by Canadian production company Nitrogen, with LA-based SD Entertainment taking up CGI duties on Bob the Builder. The result of 18 months research, Christopher Skala, executive producer and […]

Singer Jesse McCartney, who was reportedly cast as Terrence in the direct-to-video animated film Tinker Bell coming this October, also ended up being the voice of Theodore in the Alvin & The Chipmunks feature film. The young artist told the Toronto Sun that he has been a huge fan of voiceover work and animation since […]

Kung Fu Panda not only topped the U.S. box office this weekend; it also had a strong start overseas with $20.7 million from only nine markets with each posting the top result for a DreamWorks animated film, according to Variety. “The booming Russian market led the way with $9.2 million, 158% better than Ratatouille, followed […]

DreamWorks Animation’s latest, powered by rave reviews and an underserved family audience, had the studio’s highest opening for a non-sequel with an estimated $60M gross over the three-day weekend. That is $120,000 shy of Cars‘ opening but Kung Fu Panda still has a shot at beating the Pixar film’s number when final grosses come in […]