The Foundation Stone of Revolution
Since the late 80s the advent of computer animation had slowly changed the way Disney’s animated films were done. As films like Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast dabbled with CAPS to craft selected sequences, it wasn’t too long before whole films were created using computer technology, blending digital creations with hand - drawn designs. But these films were still rooted in traditional Disney animation, which was getting different results in artistic and writing quality and, most importantly, financial success. At the same time, Pixar was coming into their own with 3D computer animation and beating Disney at their own game. So it was time for Disney to adapt or die.
It would take a few more years for Disney to fully embrace computer animation, but they began a new milennium with a film unlike any they had ever produced thus far, the idea of which, began in 1986, when directors Phil Tippett and Paul Verhoeven approached Chairman Katzenberg with a pitch for a stop - motion film centred on an epic battle between a styracosaurus named Woot (I facepalmed when I heard this) and a tyrannosaurus named Groz.
With an estimated $45 million budget, the project was envisioned in the style of a nature documentary, with an uncharacteristically dark and violent tone that ended in the extinction of all dinsaurs after the apocalyptic impact of a monumental asteroid. As Roy Disney began pushing the project towards something better befitting their family - friendly style, Tippet and Verhoeven departed the project, with producer/director Thomas G. Smith taking over in 1990. Smith also battled the Petty Toolkit’s pleas to craft a “cute dinosaur story”, and continued pre - production on the film with help from screenwriter James Rosenberg. Their version of the screenplay included a conspiracy of lemurs (yes, apparently that is the correct collective noun) in the film’s narrative, with Smith keen to use live trained lemurs in the production. But Smith departed the project soon after Katzenberg asked for his assistance on Honey, I Blew Up the Kids.
The project was then handed to stop - motion animator David W. Allen, who spent months auditioning lemurs and working with the production team on visual development for the film’s dinosaur characters. In late ’92, the Katzenberg heard of Universal’s new blockbuster Jurassic Park and all the game - changing advances in digital animation of dinosaurs therein. Suddenly the idea of stop - motion animated dinosaurs on film seems like it was foredoomed to failure and the project was immediately shelved.
After Jurassic Park became the highest - grossing film of all time, dinosaurs were back in fashion and Disney saw the potential in reworking this underdog project into a fully digital animated film. In late ’94, they began development on the production by inserting CG dinosaurs against miniature model backdrops. By March ’96, CEO Eisner was impressed by the concept footage and the decision was made to take the new route of combining live - action backgrounds with CG dinosaurs.
Eisney greenlit the project, now simply called Dinosaur, and assigned Oliver & Company director George Scribner and storyboard artist Ralph Zondag to direct it. After several months of working on it, Scribner was reassigned to direct animated theme park productions for Walt Disney Imagineering. Storyboard animator Eric Leighton was brought in to take Scribner’s place as co - director, with the screenplay given to screenwriter John Harrison and animator Robert Nelson Jacobs.
THE STORY
An egg is stolen from an iguanadon nest and is misplaced in a lemur’s nest. When it hatches a few moments later, the lemurs, kindly Plio and gruff Yar, adopt him and name him Aladar. When a meteor destroys their island home a few years later, they join a herd of several species of dinosaurs en route to the “Nesting Grounds”, a sanctuary somehow left untouched by the impact of the meteor. Two other dinosaurs in the herd are an elderly brachiosaurus and triceratops who are weaker and slower, so they trail in the back. But everyone has to move quickly, and stay together, because two hungry carnotaurs are following the herd, ready and waiting to pick off any stragglers.
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Back in ’66, the Walt Disney Copany aquired Calfornian visual effects studio, Dream Quest Images, who had recently won Oscars for their groundbreaking work in the Abyss and Total Recall. Eisner merged the company with Disney Computer Graphics Unit and created the Secret Lab, assigning them the daunting task of animatiing Dinosaur.
With 48 animators on the team, the Secret Lab utilised Softimage 3D, an emerging program with the ability to create realistic 3D CG animation. After animator David Krents was discovered to have initial aspirations to be a paleontologist, he was put to the task of overseeing the character designs and the entire visual development team. His designs were drawn on paper and scanned into the computers to create #D skeltal models of dinosaurs. From there, the animators used a software programs called “Body Builder” Fur Tool” and “Mug Shot” to respectively make skin and muscles for the dinosaurs, design realistic fur for the lemurs and to create expressive facial and mouth movements to allow speaking and emotion. Softimage 3D also gave the animators the ability to craft realistic movements, based on the skeletaland muscular structures of the dinosaurs, and the animation team studied fossils of each species to make them authentic.
MY VERDICT
Since this film grossed a grand total of $348.8 million on a $127.5 million budget, it’s surprising to think that 20 years later, it has all but faded into obscurity. But at the same time, I can see why. The animation is undoubtably groundbreaking, so we can count that out as the reason. The reason because the story is incredibly boring, beset by cliché moments, dull dialogue and stereotypical characters. For all the technical wizardry, that is all this film offers to remember it by. It’s ambition and style overdoes the substance. If nothing else, the experience it gave the studio with CG animation would serve them well in future.
Is Dinosaur a DIsney Classic? As a first experiment with CG animation, it’s obvious they were still some way from understanding how the technology really works to create a true Disney Classic. This one is not even close.
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