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October 07, 2005
Curious George
Just yesterday I was complaining about the way animation companies have forsaken the hand-drawn looks of traditional animation for all-CG toons that look too bright, too shiny, and much too phony (Over the Hedge brought it on) when along comes this delightful glimpse at the new Curious George movie. Now here's an adaptation that Ron Howard and the folks at Imagine couldn't seem to make up their minds about how to animate, but from what they're showing us here, it's clear that they made the right decision.
For years, they wanted to make Curious George as a CG movie, so I've been bracing myself for something like that Garfield debacle in which a furry CG chimpanzee would pal around with a live-action Man in the Yellow Hat). Instead, Imagine has wisely opted for the glorious mix of CG and traditional animation on display in this preview, a style that hews close to Margaret and H.A. Rey's, original children's book designs while filling out the backgrounds with rich, impressionistic decorations. Curious George's world is bright and glowing, while the chimpanzee itself is a little cutesier than you might remember, with shorter legs, softer curves, and a more expressive face.
Half the reason Disney and company have all-but-abandoned their old-school animation departments is the recent upsurge in all-cartoon-all-the-time cable networks. It simply costs too much to compete, and as far as features go, they think it's the CG that sets big-screen product apart and draws in the crowds who can otherwise get their animation fix on TV. I love Pixar as much as the next guy, but this trend towards using CG on all cartoons is just another chapter in the old "TV's gonna kill the movies" concern that created innovations like Cinerama and Smell-o-vision.
But I digress. What excites me about this Curious George preview is that the style easily outstrips the flat, cheap animation we see on TV without swinging too far to the opposite extreme, where movies like Space Jam overcompensate to the point of distraction with useless tricks like 3-D shading. In the end, what matters is still character and story, and a project like this always runs the risk of upsetting fans who have formed their own impressions based on the books (sticking to the books' yellow and red color scheme for the campaign was a smart idea).
Attaching voices to these characters is every bit as dangerous, but it looks like they've resisted stunt-casting names (although this trailer certainly isn't above touting its cast). Drew Barrymore's a genius choice as George. She's done animation work before (Olive, the Other Reindeer, for instance), and few adult actresses are better at communicating coy innocence than she is. Will Ferrell's hilarious, of course, but I'm generally wary of casting it-name actors in animated movies because they bring too much of their off-screen personalities along. The way it sounds, Ferrell's keeping his comic idiosyncrasies in check and playing the Man in the Yellow Hat as a character, not another crazy variation on himself.
As for the story, it looks like Curious George's usual antics, with trips to the zoo, crazy balloon rides, and paint-splattered messes, which makes me wonder whether there will be much for grown-ups to grasp onto here, but that doesn't make this grown-up any less excited.
Posted by Peter Debruge on
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