That's so cool, it shows DW was very involved with this film.
"The Wild"
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A story was featured in today's news: http://www.animated-news.com/archives/00004930.html.ShyViolet wrote:So...how is the Wild doing overall?
Animated-News.com wrote:Meanwhile, The Wild gathered $8,050,000, having collected $21,958,000 thus far. The Disney/C.O.R.E. picture revealed excellent legs during its second weekend, slipping a slight 16.9%.
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I just saw The Wild with my friend, and I have to say I was pretty impressed! It was really entertaining, and had some GREAT sequences. My favorite was the opening scene - it was SO cool, and I thought I was watching a 2-D movies for a second! I also loved Sampson’s' flashback, it got me choked up (but then again I am a crier when it comes to movies). And the first shot of NYC was breathtaking. It's really nothing like Madagascar, totally different characters, humor and pacing. The voice acting was pretty good, and the emotional bits played out really nicely. And unlike Madagascar, this actually had a climax!
I didn't like those dung beetles though...They looked waaay too cartooney and colorful compared to the other characters. Bleh. And it really bothered me how there was NO ONE in the city.
I didn't like those dung beetles though...They looked waaay too cartooney and colorful compared to the other characters. Bleh. And it really bothered me how there was NO ONE in the city.
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I just got back from watching this and I must say that it's worth seeing once, but I don't know that I'd care to watch it again. Making the obvious comparisons between The Wild and Madagascar, I thought they were both mediocre films. I enjoyed them and laughed in all the right places, but I feel like they're both missing that special undefinable something that makes good films great or mediocre films good. Consequently, I don't think I'll be getting the dvd of either one.
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I just finished seeing "The Wild" in the movie theater for the first time tonight, and I have to say that I very much agree with eddievalient's statements above. Both "The Wild" and "Madagascar" were very mediocre films in their own ways. Since I am sure that Madigascar has been critiqued to death by now, I will focus only on my thoughts and observations about The Wild and not compare it to the Dreamworks creation.
First and foremost, as an animator and story writer myself, I always like to focus on the individual characters and see how their personalities interact, conflict, and grow from one another and how that propells the overall story. In my opinion, really strong character development and dynamics and add some power and human interest to even some of the most mundane or lack-luster stories. While overall I found the voice acting and the casting choices to be pretty good for the characters, as I whole I found myself not being able to really personally connect to any of the characters at all. That's not a good thing-- film school 101 will tell you that the audience needs to feel emotionally connected to the characters in a story or you won't find yourself caring much about those characters' trials and challenges, and you will end up being uninterested in what happens to them in the climax of the film.
As far as why I don't feel all that connected to the characters in this story, it's tough to really put my finger on, but overall I think it is because I just don't think that the individual character's motivations and personalities were developed enough. As I sat there and watched this movie, I couldn't help but think that the budding romantic relationship between Bridget the Giraffe and Benny the Squirrel should have been developed further as a plot point. As far as I can see, Bridget fell for Benny in the end with no real reason for it. She just instantly reversed her stance on him because he said some mumbo jumbo about her not needing him or something like that in the last scene, and *WHAM* she's instantly smooching him. Gosh, whatever mickey finn that squirrel slipped into that Giraffe's drink to change her mind like that I want some, because it obviously works miracles! Instead, Benny should have actually done something to change Bridget's mind, such as personally saving her from a wilderbeast so that he can be her hero or something like that. If you don't like that idea because it's not "empowering" to women enough, you could also have Benny risk his life to save Bridget but fail, and then have her save both of them from danger. Then she could love Benny for his willingness to sacrifice himself to save her, even though she really didn't need his help, making her the stronger "protector.". It's good that Benny and Bridget were dynamic as characters, each changing somewhat by the end, but geez, you've got to give a compelling reason for the change-- not just have it happen! It's sad, but the little blurbs about each character on "The Wild's" official website develop the character's backgrounds and motivations better than the movie did!
In addition, some of other main characters didn't dynamically change or grow over the course of the story. Larry the snake didn't change over the course of the movie, and Nigel the Koala didn't change either. They could go back to their homes in the zoo, and not act any different then they did before they left. Because of that, other than being used as forced-in comic relief or physical prop devices, what good are these characters? Characters that don't find themselves altered by some way in the end of the film are weak characters and become unimportant to the story.
In addition, many characters were given no reasons for their actions at all. For example, Stan and Carmine, the two sewer alligators, were portrayed in the previews as if they were mean and menacing, and it looked like they were going to have a large role in the film. Instead, while they first appeared menacing for a brief moment, they instantly became super friendly and helped the main characters find their way to the docks. Why? Why would the alligators want to help Samson and the others? Why didn't the alligators want to eat one of them? Why did the gators decide to be such good samaritans? There must be a reason! Once again, I have to refer to the official character bios on The Wild's official website:
"These giant reptiles are terrifying at first, but like all New York natives, their bark is worse than their bite." Oh, I get it, they are supposed to be symbolic of stereotypically cranky New York natives. Well geez, it would have been nice if that was mentioned or alluded to somewhere in the actual movie. I am sure that when this movie hits movie screens in Bangkok, Cape Town, or Lima when it is released worldwide that the locals in those places may not exactly get the reference. Heck, those people may not even know about the urban legend that alligators live under the sewers of New York, because I sure as heck don't know any urban legends about Bangkok or Lima! In the end, would it have really been so hard to have the alligators say, "Hey, like most New Yorkers, my bark is worse than my bite! We may have a bad reputation, but we have good hearts!" or "Hey! We're living proof that the urban legend is true!" At least then people wouldn't have to go to the official website for the film to find out why those gators are there and why they are being so friendly.
And how about that Hyrax? Why did he so quickly go from being angry that he was disturbed on the toilet to becoming darn near suicidal and practically forcing himself down Samson's throat? It was almost like the Hyrax somehow psychically figured out that Samson was frrom a zoo, even though a wild African Hyrax shouldn't even know what a zoo is. You know, I am glad that the animators, storyboarders, and script writers knew about Samson's traumatized past while they were making this film, but does that mean that every secondary character in the movie also has to be magically privy to the information that Samson is actually harmless as well? And speaking about that scene, why were all of Samson's animal friends so excited to see Samson attempt to murder that innocent (yet cranky) little hyrax by ripping him to bloody shreds in front of them??? Lions eat giraffes in the wild, and a lion is physically capable of eating a squirrel, a koala bear, and a snake if it felt so inclined. So as far as reasonable logic is concerned, you would think that watching Samson butcher a prey animal would make the rest of his friends very concerned (like in Madagascar) or at least disgusted, and not rooting for him to do it!
Also, while they did show why the head wildebeast, Kazar, was obsessed with becoming a predatory carnivore, they never explained why any of his followers ever felt compelled to follow and take orders from him, a fact that was horribly and blatantly emphasized by how quickly the wildebeast heard betrayed Kazar in the end. Why did the wildebeasts betray Kazar? Was it because he hurt that one henchman wildebeast's ankle? Was it because they suddenly realized that they were going to be killing a loving father and son and felt pitty for the two lions? Was it because they finally realized that Kazar couldn't dance well? Who knows! The film doesn't really tell you, and as far as I know, the website doesn't either. The wildebeast heard just goes from being very loyal followers of Kazar to loyal friends of Samson just like that.
Moving on to the story, I'd have to say that this film felt like it was just scrapped together. Now, I know that the rumor is that The Wild was an idea that was kicked around the Walt Disney feature animation department for a long time, even while Jeffory Katzenberg was still working there. Because of that, there are many who say that that when Katzenberg left Disney, he took his inside knowledge of The Wild's story with him and used it as the source material for Dreamwork's Madagascar. If that rumor is true, then technically Madagascar would be a rewrite of The Wild. I don't dispute that rumor and I personally find it to be very plausible, however with how poorly paced The Wild's story is, if I had to choose between the too I would actually have to say that The Wild's story looks more like a rewrite than Madagascar, even though I know that that really isn't the case!
In addition, I found myself thinking time and time again that the The Wild's timing with it's humor was way off. They would hammer you with three physical humor jokes one right after another like a machine gun so that you couldn't even get a chance to enjoy the first joke before the second and third came along came along and hit you. Then they would have each individual joke play out way too quickly for you to even appreciate the humor of the joke. Also, a pattern seemed to form with the movie where they would have long periods of time without any humor at all that would lull you out of the movie, only to have you get hammered by another one-two punch combination of overly-quickly shown gags that made you wonder to yourself, "Gee, I guess I should have laughed at those, but they're over already and we're on to the next thing!" And how about the few singing numbers and pop songs that they put into this film-- those songs (especially the one that was played in the beginning of the film after Samson told Ryan that he thought that Ryan couldn't roar, causing Ryan to run off to the green cargo container) felt very forced to me, like they were inserted into the movie by some executive at one of Disney's record labels to force a promotion of a sagging pop star's single or something.
And how about the classic dialogue of this film:
In the zoo when the truck is driving away with Ryan: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
On the tree overhanging the cliff in Africa during the wildebeast attack: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
In the wildebeast cave during the final fight: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
Lord have mercy did that get old!!!
After all of my complaining here, I am sure by now you all think that I absolutely hated this film, but that is not the case. Instead, I was very upset at how this film played out because I saw some huge potential with it. I thought that this film really could have been absolutely fantastic if it was given the proper treatment. I really *wanted* to love it! However, in the end I think that the film really suffered from having a rookie director. I'm sorry that I have to make attacks against this Spaz, especially since I saw that he was kind enough to actually post messages and answer questions in this forum, but I have got to share my true feelings about this film here. I will call it "tough love."
I personally saw such promise in this film while watching it and there were many things in the sets and character designs that left me awe-inspired, but at the same time it really hurts me as an animation fan to see the movie appear like it was a bunch of little pieces and story arcs hacked together instead of one smooth flowing piece. While I completely understand that an animated film is a huge team effort, the director is the "ship's captain" of the project, and it's the director's responsibility to make sure that everyone in the crew does their jobs correctly and that the whole film shapes up into one finished well-crafted work of story-telling art. In my humble opinion, this film was a complete mis-timed mess, so Captain Spaz goes down with the ship in my book. Think I'm being too harsh? Just look at The Wild's current box office totals-- that alone should have Disney executives grabbing the pitch forks and torches and marching to Ontario!
Unfortunately, the fact remains that I have just ripped apart a animated feature film in a place where that film's director will see it, meaning that I might possibly have just torpedoed my own future animation career! Hopefully Spaz and the rest of the people at C.O.R.E. will have mercy on my poor unemployed pathetic soul and not look up my real name and blacklist me across the entire animation industry dooming me from ever getting a job at a big studio for ever and ever, and will just take my words as the crazed sleep-deprivation induced ramblings of some random Internet nobody and not pay any mind to them. Better yet, they can hire me as a trusted part of their elite crackerjack team of animation staff and benefit from my harsh honesty and all-knowing infinite wisdom!!! Please? Pretty please??? Don't everyone answer at once now....
(I'm now going to be blacklisted for ever and ever in the animation industry for sure and end up living in a cardboard refridgerator box outside of C.O.R.E.'s studio building begging the real working animators for their pencil stubs so that I can use them to draw out my own cartoon creations on used newspaper pages in a futile effort to keep my animation career dreams alive, only waste away as a sad animation message board has-been, but as Spaz also mentioned in an earlier post, animation's a rough business!)
First and foremost, as an animator and story writer myself, I always like to focus on the individual characters and see how their personalities interact, conflict, and grow from one another and how that propells the overall story. In my opinion, really strong character development and dynamics and add some power and human interest to even some of the most mundane or lack-luster stories. While overall I found the voice acting and the casting choices to be pretty good for the characters, as I whole I found myself not being able to really personally connect to any of the characters at all. That's not a good thing-- film school 101 will tell you that the audience needs to feel emotionally connected to the characters in a story or you won't find yourself caring much about those characters' trials and challenges, and you will end up being uninterested in what happens to them in the climax of the film.
As far as why I don't feel all that connected to the characters in this story, it's tough to really put my finger on, but overall I think it is because I just don't think that the individual character's motivations and personalities were developed enough. As I sat there and watched this movie, I couldn't help but think that the budding romantic relationship between Bridget the Giraffe and Benny the Squirrel should have been developed further as a plot point. As far as I can see, Bridget fell for Benny in the end with no real reason for it. She just instantly reversed her stance on him because he said some mumbo jumbo about her not needing him or something like that in the last scene, and *WHAM* she's instantly smooching him. Gosh, whatever mickey finn that squirrel slipped into that Giraffe's drink to change her mind like that I want some, because it obviously works miracles! Instead, Benny should have actually done something to change Bridget's mind, such as personally saving her from a wilderbeast so that he can be her hero or something like that. If you don't like that idea because it's not "empowering" to women enough, you could also have Benny risk his life to save Bridget but fail, and then have her save both of them from danger. Then she could love Benny for his willingness to sacrifice himself to save her, even though she really didn't need his help, making her the stronger "protector.". It's good that Benny and Bridget were dynamic as characters, each changing somewhat by the end, but geez, you've got to give a compelling reason for the change-- not just have it happen! It's sad, but the little blurbs about each character on "The Wild's" official website develop the character's backgrounds and motivations better than the movie did!
In addition, some of other main characters didn't dynamically change or grow over the course of the story. Larry the snake didn't change over the course of the movie, and Nigel the Koala didn't change either. They could go back to their homes in the zoo, and not act any different then they did before they left. Because of that, other than being used as forced-in comic relief or physical prop devices, what good are these characters? Characters that don't find themselves altered by some way in the end of the film are weak characters and become unimportant to the story.
In addition, many characters were given no reasons for their actions at all. For example, Stan and Carmine, the two sewer alligators, were portrayed in the previews as if they were mean and menacing, and it looked like they were going to have a large role in the film. Instead, while they first appeared menacing for a brief moment, they instantly became super friendly and helped the main characters find their way to the docks. Why? Why would the alligators want to help Samson and the others? Why didn't the alligators want to eat one of them? Why did the gators decide to be such good samaritans? There must be a reason! Once again, I have to refer to the official character bios on The Wild's official website:
"These giant reptiles are terrifying at first, but like all New York natives, their bark is worse than their bite." Oh, I get it, they are supposed to be symbolic of stereotypically cranky New York natives. Well geez, it would have been nice if that was mentioned or alluded to somewhere in the actual movie. I am sure that when this movie hits movie screens in Bangkok, Cape Town, or Lima when it is released worldwide that the locals in those places may not exactly get the reference. Heck, those people may not even know about the urban legend that alligators live under the sewers of New York, because I sure as heck don't know any urban legends about Bangkok or Lima! In the end, would it have really been so hard to have the alligators say, "Hey, like most New Yorkers, my bark is worse than my bite! We may have a bad reputation, but we have good hearts!" or "Hey! We're living proof that the urban legend is true!" At least then people wouldn't have to go to the official website for the film to find out why those gators are there and why they are being so friendly.
And how about that Hyrax? Why did he so quickly go from being angry that he was disturbed on the toilet to becoming darn near suicidal and practically forcing himself down Samson's throat? It was almost like the Hyrax somehow psychically figured out that Samson was frrom a zoo, even though a wild African Hyrax shouldn't even know what a zoo is. You know, I am glad that the animators, storyboarders, and script writers knew about Samson's traumatized past while they were making this film, but does that mean that every secondary character in the movie also has to be magically privy to the information that Samson is actually harmless as well? And speaking about that scene, why were all of Samson's animal friends so excited to see Samson attempt to murder that innocent (yet cranky) little hyrax by ripping him to bloody shreds in front of them??? Lions eat giraffes in the wild, and a lion is physically capable of eating a squirrel, a koala bear, and a snake if it felt so inclined. So as far as reasonable logic is concerned, you would think that watching Samson butcher a prey animal would make the rest of his friends very concerned (like in Madagascar) or at least disgusted, and not rooting for him to do it!
Also, while they did show why the head wildebeast, Kazar, was obsessed with becoming a predatory carnivore, they never explained why any of his followers ever felt compelled to follow and take orders from him, a fact that was horribly and blatantly emphasized by how quickly the wildebeast heard betrayed Kazar in the end. Why did the wildebeasts betray Kazar? Was it because he hurt that one henchman wildebeast's ankle? Was it because they suddenly realized that they were going to be killing a loving father and son and felt pitty for the two lions? Was it because they finally realized that Kazar couldn't dance well? Who knows! The film doesn't really tell you, and as far as I know, the website doesn't either. The wildebeast heard just goes from being very loyal followers of Kazar to loyal friends of Samson just like that.
Moving on to the story, I'd have to say that this film felt like it was just scrapped together. Now, I know that the rumor is that The Wild was an idea that was kicked around the Walt Disney feature animation department for a long time, even while Jeffory Katzenberg was still working there. Because of that, there are many who say that that when Katzenberg left Disney, he took his inside knowledge of The Wild's story with him and used it as the source material for Dreamwork's Madagascar. If that rumor is true, then technically Madagascar would be a rewrite of The Wild. I don't dispute that rumor and I personally find it to be very plausible, however with how poorly paced The Wild's story is, if I had to choose between the too I would actually have to say that The Wild's story looks more like a rewrite than Madagascar, even though I know that that really isn't the case!
In addition, I found myself thinking time and time again that the The Wild's timing with it's humor was way off. They would hammer you with three physical humor jokes one right after another like a machine gun so that you couldn't even get a chance to enjoy the first joke before the second and third came along came along and hit you. Then they would have each individual joke play out way too quickly for you to even appreciate the humor of the joke. Also, a pattern seemed to form with the movie where they would have long periods of time without any humor at all that would lull you out of the movie, only to have you get hammered by another one-two punch combination of overly-quickly shown gags that made you wonder to yourself, "Gee, I guess I should have laughed at those, but they're over already and we're on to the next thing!" And how about the few singing numbers and pop songs that they put into this film-- those songs (especially the one that was played in the beginning of the film after Samson told Ryan that he thought that Ryan couldn't roar, causing Ryan to run off to the green cargo container) felt very forced to me, like they were inserted into the movie by some executive at one of Disney's record labels to force a promotion of a sagging pop star's single or something.
And how about the classic dialogue of this film:
In the zoo when the truck is driving away with Ryan: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
On the tree overhanging the cliff in Africa during the wildebeast attack: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
In the wildebeast cave during the final fight: Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan! Dad! Ryan!
Lord have mercy did that get old!!!
After all of my complaining here, I am sure by now you all think that I absolutely hated this film, but that is not the case. Instead, I was very upset at how this film played out because I saw some huge potential with it. I thought that this film really could have been absolutely fantastic if it was given the proper treatment. I really *wanted* to love it! However, in the end I think that the film really suffered from having a rookie director. I'm sorry that I have to make attacks against this Spaz, especially since I saw that he was kind enough to actually post messages and answer questions in this forum, but I have got to share my true feelings about this film here. I will call it "tough love."
I personally saw such promise in this film while watching it and there were many things in the sets and character designs that left me awe-inspired, but at the same time it really hurts me as an animation fan to see the movie appear like it was a bunch of little pieces and story arcs hacked together instead of one smooth flowing piece. While I completely understand that an animated film is a huge team effort, the director is the "ship's captain" of the project, and it's the director's responsibility to make sure that everyone in the crew does their jobs correctly and that the whole film shapes up into one finished well-crafted work of story-telling art. In my humble opinion, this film was a complete mis-timed mess, so Captain Spaz goes down with the ship in my book. Think I'm being too harsh? Just look at The Wild's current box office totals-- that alone should have Disney executives grabbing the pitch forks and torches and marching to Ontario!
Sadly, I fear that Spaz's well-spoken words here will eventually come back to haunt me, because I have really shot my own mouth off here with this post!!! When I first wrote this little critique of mine, I had not read all 15 pages of the previous posts in this thread, and I had no idea that the director himself and a team of his staff had been posting to this thread. When I did see that director Steve "Spaz" Williams had been posting here I faced a huge dilemma: should I revise my post and not make it so critical and scathing, or should I boldly not censor myself and leave all of my guns blazing away without any regard for who I was launching my salvos at? In the end I chose a middle path and only slightly revised the last paragraph of my original post to be more respectful to Spaz, and left everything else exactly how it was written so that my writing reflected my true opinions and feelings.spaz wrote:sure. as you guys know, i tend to get myself in trouble when shooting off my mouth or telling the truth or both.
Unfortunately, the fact remains that I have just ripped apart a animated feature film in a place where that film's director will see it, meaning that I might possibly have just torpedoed my own future animation career! Hopefully Spaz and the rest of the people at C.O.R.E. will have mercy on my poor unemployed pathetic soul and not look up my real name and blacklist me across the entire animation industry dooming me from ever getting a job at a big studio for ever and ever, and will just take my words as the crazed sleep-deprivation induced ramblings of some random Internet nobody and not pay any mind to them. Better yet, they can hire me as a trusted part of their elite crackerjack team of animation staff and benefit from my harsh honesty and all-knowing infinite wisdom!!! Please? Pretty please??? Don't everyone answer at once now....
(I'm now going to be blacklisted for ever and ever in the animation industry for sure and end up living in a cardboard refridgerator box outside of C.O.R.E.'s studio building begging the real working animators for their pencil stubs so that I can use them to draw out my own cartoon creations on used newspaper pages in a futile effort to keep my animation career dreams alive, only waste away as a sad animation message board has-been, but as Spaz also mentioned in an earlier post, animation's a rough business!)
There's a 68.71% chance that I'm right.
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I would think that the fact that THEY ARE IN NEW YORK would have been reason enough as to why they are ACTING LIKE THEY ARE NEW YORKERSHoagiebot wrote:
In addition, many characters were given no reasons for their actions at all. For example, Stan and Carmine, the two sewer alligators, were portrayed in the previews as if they were mean and menacing, and it looked like they were going to have a large role in the film. Instead, while they first appeared menacing for a brief moment, they instantly became super friendly and helped the main characters find their way to the docks. Why? Why would the alligators want to help Samson and the others? Why didn't the alligators want to eat one of them? Why did the gators decide to be such good samaritans? There must be a reason! Once again, I have to refer to the official character bios on The Wild's official website:
"These giant reptiles are terrifying at first, but like all New York natives, their bark is worse than their bite." Oh, I get it, they are supposed to be symbolic of stereotypically cranky New York natives. Well geez, it would have been nice if that was mentioned or alluded to somewhere in the actual movie. I am sure that when this movie hits movie screens in Bangkok, Cape Town, or Lima when it is released worldwide that the locals in those places may not exactly get the reference. Heck, those people may not even know about the urban legend that alligators live under the sewers of New York, because I sure as heck don't know any urban legends about Bangkok or Lima! In the end, would it have really been so hard to have the alligators say, "Hey, like most New Yorkers, my bark is worse than my bite! We may have a bad reputation, but we have good hearts!" or "Hey! We're living proof that the urban legend is true!" At least then people wouldn't have to go to the official website for the film to find out why those gators are there and why they are being so friendly.
I can't comment on the rest, as I skimmed most of it, and I don't agree with most of it. So I just commented on this part.
