Finding Nemo Countdown

[Granite]

11 Days!!!



Don't worry whales only eat krill....oh look krill!

[Granite]

10 Days!!!

[radstar]

9 days

[Granite]

8 days!!!

[Granite]

7 Days!!! That's one week!

[primapeaks]

This is sweet:

[radstar]

6 days!

[Granite]

Five Days!!!



Doesn't the director Andrew Stanton...


...bear a strange resembalence to Matthew Perry (from friends)

[radstar]

Originally posted by Granite
Doesn't the director Andrew Stanton...


...bear a strange resembalence to Matthew Perry (from friends)

not even close.... but that's my opinion

[Granite]

4 Days!!!!

[Granite]

3 Days!!!

[primapeaks]

How Pixar stays in 'toon'
'Finding Nemo' director underscores animation studio's reliance on fostering new talent

Whenever "Finding Nemo" director Andrew Stanton forgets what it's like to be young, there's a reminder around the corner.

It's not in the airplane-hanger-size lobby of Pixar's headquarters in Emeryville, which is a prepubescent's paradise of foosball and pool tables, movie posters and cafeteria workers serving fun food. It's also not in the decorated-by-Dr. Seuss lounge area outside Stanton's office, which blends white shag carpet, a coffee-table aquarium and a school of clown-fish pillows floating on an electric blue couch.

Stanton instead points to the company's newest group of upstream-swimming employees, who have the annoying habit of showing their bosses better ways of doing things.

"When we see a group of twentysomethings come in, it wakes all of us up and reminds us of the youth and vigor we had on the first (film)," said Stanton, a 13-year Pixar veteran. "You feel it in the company, no matter how old you are or how long you worked here. You sort of get this can-do attitude all over again."

"Finding Nemo," Stanton's directorial debut at Pixar, is about an older fish who learns to shed his protective ways and trust his precocious son. Viewers may not realize that the plot is also the professional credo of John Lasseter, who hired Stanton, "Monsters, Inc." director Pete Docter and most of Pixar's top animation talent.

"I remember working at places in my career where the creative leadership was threatened by the young people coming in," Lasseter said. "I was told, 'Just be quiet and do what you're told.' I decided if I was ever in charge I wouldn't say to a young guy what was said to me."

Pixar Animation Studios had three employees when Lasseter hired Stanton in 1990. There are close to 750 on Pixar's payroll now, but the computer- animation mill still looks absolutely nothing like a Los Angeles movie studio.

The Hollywood way is to deal with high-priced free agents, but Lasseter uses Pixar like a baseball farm system, handpicking much of his top talent from the animation program at the California Institute of the Arts and nurturing them for years.

Stanton is typical of the group, graduating from CalArts in 1987 and working on low-profile animation jobs in Los Angeles before joining Pixar. Stanton worked as a writer on "Toy Story" (1995) and a co-director on "A Bug's Life" (1998) before directing "Finding Nemo." Docter (CalArts '90) took a similar path, writing for both "Toy Story" films before directing "Monsters, Inc."

The company's brain trust -- which includes Stanton, Docter, Lasseter (CalArts '79) and Brad Bird -- rotate in the director's chair. Next up is Bird's "The Incredibles" in 2004, followed by Lasseter's "Cars" in 2005.

"Dealing with middle management, departments and studio heads -- we have none of that," Stanton said. "That's the thing that makes this place incredibly unique. It's run by a creative person from the top, and there's no red tape. After John come people like me and Pete and Brad Bird, and we run our own movies."

The lack of cynicism among Pixar's employees may have something to do with the company's uninterrupted string of successes. Other studios have learned that a couple of box-office losers can turn a utopian work environment into a heads-will-roll land of reality checks and pink slips.

The time will come when the mentors and apprentices at Pixar deal with failure, but it probably won't be this year.

"Finding Nemo" has everything that worked in the other films -- a blend of offbeat humor for adults, physical humor for kids, revolutionary visuals and a strong emotional core -- without falling into the skinny-girl-and-two- sidekicks formula that derailed Disney's run of blockbuster success in the 1980s and 1990s. (Disney distributes Pixar films.)

"Finding Nemo" is "The Odyssey" with gills, sending clown fish Marlin (voiced by Albert Brooks) and his son, Nemo (Alexander Gould), on a journey that's as big as the ocean. Set pieces include everything from a coral reef to a fish tank to the inside of a whale.

The idea came to Stanton 11 years ago in Vallejo when the animator ushered his toddler son through a glass tunnel in the shark tank at Marine World.

"You could just feel what it's like to be underwater," Stanton said. "Even 10 years ago I said, 'This could be done in CG and we could match this perfectly.' Ever since then I could never get it out of my head."

The idea may have been born in the East Bay, but the movie takes place in Australia, where reefs are plentiful and the fish are more animation-friendly. (The merchandising prospects for "Finding Nemo" would no doubt be murkier if the lead character were a sardine.)

It's not hard to predict which characters could end up on a McDonald's giveaway drink glass. Front-runners include Nemo, Marlin, blue tang Dori (Ellen DeGeneres) and sea turtle Crush (voiced by Stanton, channeling Sean Penn as Jeff Spicoli in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High").

But the movie is impressive for its breadth of characters, including a stingray, trio of sharks and a school of fish voiced by Pixar good-luck charm John Ratzenberger -- who has appeared in all of the studio's feature films.

Ratzenberg, best known as Cliff Clavin in "Cheers," was first recruited to play the pig toy Hamm in "Toy Story." He's observed that the company is a throwback to a better moviemaking time.

"Pixar is an old-fashioned company," Ratzenberger said. "Their philosophy . . . in the entertainment industry it doesn't exist anymore.

"It's an American company that makes a great product, and the same people that started it are still there, and every product they try to outdo what they did before."

In their quest to make a great product, Pixar executives insist that egos can't get in the way.

Just as Lasseter kept an open mind for Stanton's ideas, the "Finding Nemo" director accepted as much help as he could get -- willingly spewing a long list of scenes in the film inspired by his underlings on the Pixar food chain.

Stanton said his early version of the whale set piece was on the "Pinocchio track," with the director looking to put funny things in the whale's stomach. The scene, which Stanton said is his favorite in the film, now has a more classic appearance.

"Somebody started drawing a picture inside the whale's mouth and using the baleen like cathedral lighting," Stanton said. "The minute I saw it I said, 'We're switching to that.' "

Stanton also changed the look of a carnivorous deep-sea angler fish on a suggestion (his evil red light is now a clinical blue), and designed the movie's fish tank by committee.

"The No. 1 one rule is it doesn't matter whose idea it is, the best idea gets in the picture," Lasseter said.

Stanton adds: "You actually look forward to those kinds of things every day.

You actually hope somebody will come to you and go, 'I know what you're trying to do, but you're not doing it, and here's where you need to go.' Those are the best kind of days."

That attitude seems to inspire loyalty. All of the primary writers and directors who participated in Pixar's first feature film, "Toy Story," are still with the company. Stanton, for one, can't imagine ever leaving.

"I had such a bad stint in Los Angeles. I was just getting hired to push a pencil around," Stanton said, recalling his pre-Pixar days. "Then (John) came and said, 'I love your films. The way you think is what I want.' I had never heard that in my professional life.

"It's so easy to give 200 percent when you know that's why you've been asked. I turn around and try to do the same thing -- 'I want you because of who you are, not just to fill a slot.' "

[Granite]

Two Days!!!!!!!!!!

[Granite]

One Day! It starts TOMORROW!!!!!!!!