Hmm, that could prove to be a very inersting conumdrum.

On the one hand, that Chrismas Carol sounds really good, especially if they're able to get that cast. On the other hand, I really want to see Frog Princess succeed.

I think that March release date would be a perfect soluion, but hat's just me..

I'm torn.

I like the idea of The Christmas Carol as Zemeckis's first release for Disney; I think that it will make the company a lot of money, and I personally liked what Zemeckis did with Monster House, so I think that in the end, it will turn out to be a good movie and not just a "big-name gimmick production."

But I am concerned about the Frog Princess.  I too was hoping it would get highlighted and given the chance to succeed.  Typically, studios release their big guns either in the summer or the holidays, and I assumed that since that was being given the November 2009 release date, it would have a good chance.  But we've seen how well the latest releases do in March, so I can't really fault Musker and Clements for feeling that way.  This was supposed to be the big comeback for WDAS.  This release date just doesn't feel right.

If anything, wait to release Frog Princess during the summer of 2010 (since the Pixar release that year - Toy Story 3 - is scheduled for the winter anyway).  How's Rapunzel coming along?  Was that supposed to be the one that was going to be released summer of 2010?

How is Disney going to fit releasing a WDAS, Pixar, and Zemeckis film each year?  Somebody is going to get left with the scrap release date, and it would be a shame if WDAS was always the one getting the short end of the stick.

A Christmas Carrol with Jim Carrey? Suddenly I am REALLY looking forward to something. The picture alone looks incredible. The only thing I am wondering about is this "disney digital 3D".  

I've seen all the 3D movies Disney has done lately.... and while "cool" enough.... they truly don't compare to the IMAX 3D effects I experienced with the Polar Express. I hope Zemeckis makes an arguement to do the film in IMAX. Even though there are far less IMAX theaters... its easy to "downgrade" to standard 3D. Do it right ... put us IN that movie and it will pay off.

For someone who is all for the THEATER and not home video ... this is cool stuff. This and Jim Camerons work with 3D truly will be the future. Get THAT on blu ray DVD? I think not.

As far as the Frog Princess is concerned. I say its nothing to worry about. Traditional Animation is one thing .... CGI is another. Frog will have story and music... and charm. All CGI movies are more like flash, bang, wow ... I personally can't wait for this film. I think there is room in the theater at the same time for both.

Hows this for a gimmick .... a Disney DOUBLE FEATURE.

Yes.... I think that the pressure is on for those guys working on Frog .... REAL PRESURE. But I am rooting for them.

Oh ... and someone at Disney ... please DO SOMETHING with Elliot !!! (aka ... Pete's Dragon). People today will LOVE the Dragon. I'm sure of this.

One word: SIGH. I hate motion capture, gives me the creeps. Why... Why... Why waste another good story on zombie animation?

Concerning "Frog": they should have given it the Winter release. I know the March release ties in with the movie and Mardi Grass etc., but the movie won't be as successful I think.

2009 will be a busy year for big Disney projects, as I hear. "Up", "The Frog Princess", "John Carter of Mars", "Jungle Cruise", "The Monstrous Memoirs of a Mighty McFearless", "Swiss Family Robinson", ...

Maybe a little too busy? Especially with the 3 (or 4) animated movies coming out.

I also wondered. The "speculative release dates" of the WDFA movies are now:

* "Bolt" -- November 26, 2008

* "Rapunzel" -- June 2009

* "The Princess and the Frog" -- December 18, 2009

Even if they moved "The Frog Princess" to March 2010, you still would have "Up" and "Rapunzel" pretty close to each-other. "Up" has a release date of June 12! Jim, I want to know more about "Rapunzel". Is is being pushed back, how is it getting along, will they change the release date to something less competitive (end of Summer 2009, or something like that)? Because having a Pixar and WDFA movie in the same month is ludicrous.

Disney is really getting dysfunctional with all these movies on top of each other.  Looks like they need to sit down and look at how they can stretch the year out more.  300 proved that a movie could open in March with the right marketing and will power so I'm not worried is Frog Princess is moved to there.  In fact it'll probably be better for it because the winter is crowded lately it wouldn't have time to breathe.  What about the Narnia sequels?  Dis ney is just going to start taking money from itself if they aren't careful.  How about using the Christmas Carol to help promote Princess?  Makes way more sense in my book.

Maybe its a poor example, since "Home on the Range" SUCKED, but wasn't it released in late March/early April? And we saw how well that did.

I don't know, if they really want to revive 2D animation they need to make it stand out, make it an event like they used to. March is so uneventful, no one cares if it coincides with Mardi Gras - thats a lame excuse.

I say release "The Princess and The Frog" November 2009 without "A Christmas Carol", or push it back to the SUMMER of 2010, even though I really don't want to wait.

I never liked the fact that Disney and Zemekis made that motion-capture company.  I, too, don't like the look of motion capture.  Normally I wouldn't care about a Zemekis picture, but, since it's a Disney movie, I'm sort of interested- part of me wants it to do well, since it's Disney, but, since I don't like the idea of this Zemekis-Disney-motion-capture thing, I kind of hope it does bad and that tht deal goes bye-bye.  

I'm also concerned about all of these movies coming out at once.  Maybe "A Christmas Carol" will have some problems along the way and it'll come out later than anticipated...so then the Disney animated features will come out on time, and have good release dates.  

I enjoy the Pixar movies, but I can imagine that, if the previously-stated scenario occurs that LiverGap mentioned- a WDFA picture, a Pixar picture, and a Zemekis picture come out in a year (I hadn't heard about Zemekis having one a year, but I'll believe it), they're going to have to spread those out.  And, I wonder how Mr. Lasseter feels about this Zemekis deal- I'd love it if he didn't like it.  I can't help but feel that Lasseter will pick first the date for the Pixar film, and then choose the WDFA film's date.

I really want "The Frog Princess" to do well, and if it fails just because it's released at the "wrong" time of year, then I will have lost faith in Team Disney.  It wouldn't be the creative team's fault.

I thought I'd see a few people echoing my thoughts... "OMG, not ANOTHER version of A Christmas Carol... how many times can people sit through the same basic story?"  Let alone all the millions of tributes/parodies/homages in every sitcom and TV show that can't think up anything original for their christmas episode... and yet, surprisingly everyone seems to be looking forward to it.  

Maybe I'm just getting a little tired of the Mouse being an 800 pound gorilla pushing for copyright extensions, chasing nurseries that paint mouse characters on the wall, etc... but constantly going to the public domain well for their movies.  IMO it's a darn good thing they bought Pixar... at least someone comes up with generally new stories (although Cars was a LOT like Doc Hollywood :) )

Of course, it is getting kinda annoying that have millions of "Christmas Carol" adaptions, but the story is just so universal. If Disney can give the story a new twist (or maybe just sticking to the original version is already a twist on its own) I wouldn't mind.

But you know what I would love for Disney to do? Adapt some of its original shorts into full feature films. That would be ideal!! They already own the source material, so why not.. (But I don't mean DisneyToon adaptions of it, I mean WDFA adaptions.)

(that have = to have)

I guess we're in the minority here, but I agree that motion capture is creepy. Like dead animated characters moving around on the screen.

I'm also in the minority with my disdain for Jim Carrey. He's a ham and he overacts in everything he's in. Can't you just see Scrooge flailing around spastically like The Grinch/AceVentura/EveryCharacterJimCarreyPlays. I thought he was good in "The Truman Show" when he reigned himself in a bit, but for the most part, I just don't get the appeal.

Sounds like a mess waiting to happen.

Although I liked Monster House (especially in 3D), I can't say I'm looking forward to Christmas Carol.  Much of that is probably due to how much I hated Polar Express.  Great backgrounds, terrible characters and worse script.  And I'm not a fan of stunt casting.  Using big name celebrities is often distracting (I don't want to see Hanks doing animation ever again other than TS3), and the mocap thing with one actor playing multiple parts is worse.  This just sounds like a rehash of Polar Express.

I am curious about Beowulf, especially since it is supposed to be adult oriented and very violent.  But it's supposed to be released in November, but not a single image has been released from the film, much less a teaser trailer.  I wonder if that's just intense secrecy or an indication of possible problems?

As for mocap itself, I think it's an excellent tool.  But so far it just seems much more suited for special FX characters in live action films than "cartoon" characters in animated films.  Polar Express was creepy and even Monster House didn't seem quite right, but I don't think anyone would complain about the mocap in LOTR, Pirates, or even Kong.  Gollum and Davy Jones were both spectacularly real and expressive.  On the other hand, if you look at the latest Potter movie, Grawp was some sort of mocap while Kreatcher was fully animated and in that case I think the latter was a much better result.

Release dates for the disney stuff will change.  There's no way they'll release Rapunzel and Up in the same month.  The only thing that makes sense is releasing one Pixar a year and one "Disney", one in the summer and one at thanksgiving or christmas.  If they have something extra to squeeze in like Christmas Carol, the spring isn't a bad time to make a release.  Movies like Ice age and the sequel have shown that you can make money releasing animation in march.  But that's still the exception, if the next couple 2D films will determine the fate of the medium, they should be given every possible advantage.

Is it just me, or are those Horton images pretty gorgeous?  I hope the movie can maintain that level of art and have a good script, those stills look absolutely amazing.

Steve - you called that one!  Pleeeez!  Another Christmas Carol?  It took Jim - what?  Half a dozen articles to review all of them?  Sounds like a huge waste of effort.

>>> 2009 will be a busy year for big Disney projects, as I hear. "Up", "The Frog Princess", "John Carter of Mars" ... <<<

I believe I heard the first John Carter of Mars film's tentative release year is 2011, and that it will be a Pixar film (which is why I believe - or more like hoping very strongly - that Cars 2 is just a nasty rumor).

The Polar Express was....  blech.  Yes, that one did make me very skeptical of motion capture animation.  But I thought they improved by leaps and bounds with the release of Monster House, and I think they'll just get better.  Though I have to agree that motion capture is best suited for live action animated figures like Gollum.  

I have no problem with Christmas Carol being retold, I love that story.  I'd like it even better if they stuck with the original script (which many versions have done), but with Jim Carrey doing a lot of the acting, I somehow doubt they will.  Not saying they won't screw it up, but I'm confident they won't absolutely destroy the story.

Here's what I believed the tentative release schedule for Disney's films to be (without the Zemeckis features, which I completely overlooked).  Anyone with more info, please fill in/correct the blanks.

2008

May - Chronicles of Narnia II

June - Wall*E

November - Bolt

2009

May - Chronicles of Narnia III

June - Up

July - Prince of Persia

November - Christmas Carol (Thought this was gonna be Frog Princess, but I guess not)

2010

March - Frog Princess (?)

June - Rapunzel (Princess overkill?  Maybe Frog Princess here, Rapunzel next holiday?)

November - Toy Story 3

2011

June - Princess of Mars

November - Rapunzel

No clue what Zemeckis might be working on other than Christmas Carol, and that's all because of this article too.  And I haven't heard about when the rest of the Chronicles might be released.

I love the idea of a Disney Digital 3D release of a new Christmas Carol movie!  Sure, the story is a little old, but just because something is old doesn't mean it's not good! I really don't care who they have do the voices, although unknowns would probably be better than big stars.  They can sometimes be a bit of a distraction.

We don't live very far from Downtown Disney here in Florida and they have one of the digital theatres so I take my family to see EVERY Disney movie released in 3D.  It may be a gimmick, but it's a great one!

Classic story + Cutting edge technology = Happy Disney Family

Someone mentioned earlier about Disney now releasing 3 major animated films a year (WDFA, Pixar, and Zemeckis), and one always having to get jipped by getting an off-season/  or March release.  

What if a Pixar film tried something new and had a new release open in March instead of always in summer/ winter-holiday season? After seeing how Ratatouille is a great movie but is not having the numbers it deserves (in my opinion), why not try moving a Pixar movie to some other time like March so there would be much less competition against it? I think one of the main factors that is playing against Ratatouille is there is so much other competition during this summer season, and I think a March Pixar release really would let a film dominate the box office, as the competition is much less.

WDFA NEEDS to have a hit with The Frog Princess, so I would say to wait until summer 2010 for TFP, if you have to. Summer 09 will already be a crowded animation year with Rapunzel and Up, not including animated movies from other studios that come out during the summer. TFP an important movie that has a lot of impact on WDFA's future, take no risks with this one. Have Christmas Carol open winter of 2009, unless they have problems and have to bump up the date until winter of 2010, in which case Christmas Carol would then be going head-to-head with Toy Story 3.

I think this Imagemovers Digital company will be very hard for Disney to juggle already with Pixar and WDFA, especially if Imagemovers continues to claim important times of the year when movie-attendance is high to release their pictures. For the most part, Pixar and WDFA have been able to rotate and share the Summer/ Winter holiday openings, but with this new 3rd company, I think it will get harder for Disney to juggle their number of animated movies versus their number of possible release dates.

The big solution: have Dick Cook (or Bob Iger) call up Robert Zemeckis, let him say, "Hay, Robert. You know that deal we made last spring? Uhmm.. Yeah.. Not happening. It's not you, it's us. Have a nice day :)", and then WDFA/Pixar have enough opening spots again for their movies.

(But really, if you think about who has priority with setting release dates. Does anybody really think Zemeckis has got more power to do that than Lasseter & Catmull? Sure as hell not.)

EMPOOR SAID..."The big solution: have Dick Cook (or Bob Iger) call up Robert Zemeckis, let him say, "Hay, Robert. You know that deal we made last spring? Uhmm.. Yeah.. Not happening. It's not you, it's us. Have a nice day :)", and then WDFA/Pixar have enough opening spots again for their movies."  

...and keep the hundreds of million$ we set you up with...  fire the 250 people you just hired in the bay area,( including the likes of Acadamy Award winner Doug Chaing)... then vacate the huge compoud we recently bought for you and all these contracted employees...   Yeah, Empoor, sounds like good advice. Odd, how you think Iger and Cook are brilliant for the Pixar deal...but, think they've somehow lost their minds by hooking-up with a motion picture icon. I'm thinking they just may have this "too many movies to release", under control...what a terrible problem to have, huh?  

Yeah, really odd I thought Iger and Cook were brilliant for it.. Considering Miss Jenny Eisicks, the d-girl from Hollywood Pictures, and Ronny Feldman, the handyman who works at the Team Disney Building, have set up the deal, and NOT the studio chairman or CEO.. 8-) Dear lord..

And somebody obviously missed the "(But really .. not.)" part, emphasizing on the "really" part. Odd.

Yes I agree that there have been too many adaptations of "A Christmas Carol." At least "The Polar Express" had never been adapted before and it felt new, even if the animation made it look and feel creepy.  It was also hard to find a plot in that movie.  But also, I'm really not a big Jim Carey fan; Tom Hanks is tolerable.

Maybe it would just work if this movie were released the first weekend in November (like how "The Incredibles," "Brother Bear," and "Chicken Little" did), and then have The Pricness and the Frog open a few days before Christmas. That would give these two movies a little over a month and a half apart, and i mean thats not so bad when you consider that Shrek the Third came out a little over a month and a week before Ratatouille did, with Surf's Up sandwiched in between.

I honestly think that Disney can work out this Princess and the Frog/ A Christmas Carol clash, but I really think they should pay attention to Up and Rapunzel both coming June 2009.

Empoor...I'm not a very bright person...you win by default...I have no idea what you're cryptic, sarcasm layden, post is about. But, good luck to you:)  Maybe my problem was in reading your posts for months, I see that you have a great love for Pixar...so, when you use "sarcasm" on the heels of..."I hate motion capture, gives me the creeps. Why... Why... Why waste another good story on zombie animation?"...the comedy has a tough time coming through...sorry. Cheers!  

Uhm, Pixar..? Where the hell did that came from? I was (obviously, since the article is about it) talking about ImageMovers.. And I do love Pixar, but not in the messias kind of way.

(Oh, and it is pretty clear that my post was about the fact that Pixar and WDFA would have first choice in settings release dates; I actually say something  (remotely) nice about Lasseter for a change, and it's no good. :P)

Empoor...you're right...I'm sorry...please don't curse anymore...please.  I must go to dinner...thank you...we're thinking about Mexican...maybe Italian.

It's not a matter of right or wrong, it's a matter of perspective and opinion ;)

Bon appétit.

I don't know why all the concern over release dates....

The more auditoriums at the multiplex showing Disney produced movies, the fewer auditoriums are showing films produced by DreamWorks, Universal, Paramount, etc.

The key is to lower the cost of production ... and to up the QUALITY of the films... then focus on the combined profits of everything you put out rather than one at a time.

Bottom line ... If the movies are GOOD .. then more is better.  Make them so good people start saving their money to see them.

Yes ... there are some people who may only spend $10 once to see one movie and will choose .... But here is the deal ... if Frog, Christmas Carol, Toy Story 3 etc ... are all good and are getting the types of praise that Ratatouille is getting.... I don't care if all these movies come out on the same day ... I will go see them all before they are gone. That's all that matters.

Why can there be 15 Live action movies out at one time, but only 2 or 3 animated ones?

Consider the more movies you produce ... the more DVD releases you will have as well. I purchased about 11 DVDs this year ... only one of them is Pixar... why? Because Pixar only made ONE movie. That’s why. If they had made 2, 3 or 4 movies ... I would have purchased 12, 13 or 14 DVDs this year.

You guys need to start thinking out of the box. MARKET SHARE is not about one product dominating the market, breaking records, saving face, etc .... It’s about a continuous flow of products, quality products consistently remaining IN the market all of the time.

Disney definitely has their hands full juggling their in-house animation films with Pixar. I'm concerned that Rapunzel and Frog Princess will be released too close to each other (two princess tales from different mediums). Depending on how the audience feels about 2-D animation, 3-D, and what Disney comes up with at the time, one of those films may suffer from the circumstances.

My pique with this new Christmas Carol movie is not so much it being motion-capture, but the fact that it's YET ANOTHER incarnation of the novel. I got nothing against the story itself, but how the hell many more versions of this tale are we going to see?

>>> "...how the hell many more versions of this tale are we going to see?" <<<

I can guarantee you it will not be the last.  I'm just glad Disney will be the first one to produce it under the CG animation banner (albeit motion capture, but hey, it's still considered animation).

RLuke - though I'd like to believe that release dates don't matter either, I really think competition at the box office affects receipts.  In fact, I think the more good movies there are out at one time, there is a smaller chance that each of those movies perform the way they would if they were released w/o any competition.  Obviously Ratatouille comes to mind, but I'm thinking more of films like Surf's Up and Live Free or Die Hard, which got better reviews than movies like Transformers.  It's hard for a normal family to shell out $50-$70 every weekend just to see all the "must-see" movies coming out, so some unfortunately get demoted to the top of their netflix queues.

Which is why even though I don't fully agree with what JPLo825 suggested - Pixar releasing their movie in March where there's no competition (I don't agree because there is no competition in that month for a reason; not exactly movie-going time) - I think it would be a good strategy for the films that are critically acclaimed (like the aforementioned movies) but might get lost in the shuffle when pit against the summer/holiday blockbusters.

Anyone seen the new "Beowulf" trailer? Creepy. And not "oeh, this is scary"-creepy, but "iew, are you serious?!"-creepy.

Yes, very creepy.  In fact I hate it.  What's the point of the characters being CG?  Might as well use live action, e.g. Sky Captain.  I liked Monster House's look much better for some reason (Maybe because I thought the characters were more "cartoony" in it; this is reverting back to "too-much-realism").  I seriously hope Christmas Carol isn't as creepy as that.  

And what audience is Zemeckis targeting this?  It's being released alongside Bee Movie and Enchanted, and supposedly it contains nudity (I'm assuming a creepy nude Angelina Jolie, though), so it's not going to be a family film.  Teenagers?  Again, what's the point of CG animated characters if they're going to look exactly like the real actors, except with a zombified look?  This looks like it will bomb.  

Link for those who haven't seen it:  http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/beowulf/large.html

I have to agree .... its almost scary ... but not in a good way. There is again something wrong with the eyes. I don't know how eyes on most animated characters in other movies can look so real and full of emotion .... but on these people .. just like the ones in Polar Express.... they don't. There is still something that needs perfecting in this process.  

"Rat" just passed $170 mil...is that good?  

Who knows what Wall Street analysts think.  I personally expected $170 mil max, but now it looks like this will make it past $180 (if it's lucky, it'll squeak past $190; though I think $200 mil is out of the question now).  

Given that production costs were said to be $150 mil, then I'm guessing another $50 million for marketing, it's already broken even (foreign box office receipts push it past $200 mil now) - so anything else it makes from here on out is profit for the Mouse House...  So yeah, I think it's good.

But again, that's me.  But Wall Street, from the sounds of all the negativity coming from them even last year with Cars making $244 mil domestically, will most likely frown upon it.

Actually, "Ratatouille" has to make around $ 363 million worldwide if it wants to break even with a total budget of $ 200 million. Considering studios get around 55% of the box office grosses (and sometimes even less of the non-domestic gross).

empoor - Can you explain that a bit more?  Why would it have to make $363 million (which I think it will) WW to break even when only $200 million was spent?  

Also, does that mean Meet The Robinsons failed to break even?  Was kinda hoping Disney made even a modest profit on that at least.

Well, like I said, studios will not get 100% of the box office gross. Only around 55%. So, making $ 200 million on a $ 200 million budget (1=1) isn't enough.

55% of $ 363 million is $ 199,65 million.

But when a movie doesn't meet its box office break-even-point, in most situations it will turn a profit on dvd sales, merchandising, television rights, etc.

If the total budget for "Meet the Robinsons" was around the $ 80 million (which I highly doubt) the movie made it to its break-even-point.

Oh, duh, you meant theaters and whatever other middlemen there are.  Got it.

Well, after Jim's last article on how much MTR went over-budget because of tinkering, I doubt it too.  Sad considering how much positive buzz it was getting at first.

So considering the glut of "traditionally animated CG" films out there now, maybe Zemeckis's films will do well, if only because kids tell their parents they'd rather see the "creepy-looking" cartoon rather than the one that looks like every other one that comes out.  Who knows.