Nineteen Eighty Four Tenth Anniversary
First things first, I'm okay. Just busy with other stuff.
Anyways...
Nineteen Eighty Four (1998)
Tenth Anniversary Retrospective
Winston Smith (voiced by Christian Bale; animation supervised by Daniel Abbott)
For a full plot summary of the film, click HERE.
Other studios had made George Orwell's novel into film versions released to varying degrees of success. Disney acquired the film rights from the Orwell estate as early as 1992, but didn't begin production for another three years. Among the animation staff members, there was healthy skepticism about whether or not the book would translate well enough into a cartoon.
Daniel Abbott: "Richard [Williams] wanted to make a feature of the book around '82. He wanted to do it as soon as The Thief and the Cobbler was finished. But we found out later that [20th Century Fox] had already put a live action version into production. That ended up being the version with John Hurt. I had read the book a few times before, a brilliant book in my opinion. After moving on to Disney, Andreas Deja casually mentioned the book to me. Two days later, we both pitched a spec script to Don Bluth...and later that week we had the rights."
Paula Sigman (Disney historian): "When Disney put Nineteen Eighty Four into production, there were some on the staff who questioned the studio's decision to release the film under the Disney brand rather than Hyperion. Back then, moviegoers' tastes were teetering towards lighter fare and Disney at the time was seen as being for older children."
Andreas Deja: "Pre-production began in late 1995...early 1996. Animation began about March of '96. But in July of that year, that was when the Bronco Chase happened. I think that distracted some of the staff for a while, but we had a film to deliver and we had to soldier on."
Roy E. Disney: "The decision by Jack in the Box, KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell to cancel the fast food tie-in at the last minute was a huge blow to our marketing efforts for the film. The scramble to regroup and strategize a whole new campaign after two years of work cost us an additional $34 million on top of what we spent on production."
Glen Keane: "The reviews were mixed, but we were glad to get that film out of our system."
Anyways...
Nineteen Eighty Four (1998)
Tenth Anniversary Retrospective
Winston Smith (voiced by Christian Bale; animation supervised by Daniel Abbott)
For a full plot summary of the film, click HERE.
Other studios had made George Orwell's novel into film versions released to varying degrees of success. Disney acquired the film rights from the Orwell estate as early as 1992, but didn't begin production for another three years. Among the animation staff members, there was healthy skepticism about whether or not the book would translate well enough into a cartoon.
Daniel Abbott: "Richard [Williams] wanted to make a feature of the book around '82. He wanted to do it as soon as The Thief and the Cobbler was finished. But we found out later that [20th Century Fox] had already put a live action version into production. That ended up being the version with John Hurt. I had read the book a few times before, a brilliant book in my opinion. After moving on to Disney, Andreas Deja casually mentioned the book to me. Two days later, we both pitched a spec script to Don Bluth...and later that week we had the rights."
Paula Sigman (Disney historian): "When Disney put Nineteen Eighty Four into production, there were some on the staff who questioned the studio's decision to release the film under the Disney brand rather than Hyperion. Back then, moviegoers' tastes were teetering towards lighter fare and Disney at the time was seen as being for older children."
Andreas Deja: "Pre-production began in late 1995...early 1996. Animation began about March of '96. But in July of that year, that was when the Bronco Chase happened. I think that distracted some of the staff for a while, but we had a film to deliver and we had to soldier on."
Roy E. Disney: "The decision by Jack in the Box, KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell to cancel the fast food tie-in at the last minute was a huge blow to our marketing efforts for the film. The scramble to regroup and strategize a whole new campaign after two years of work cost us an additional $34 million on top of what we spent on production."
Glen Keane: "The reviews were mixed, but we were glad to get that film out of our system."