Daily post &Mary Blair 02 Jul 2007 08:22 am
Mary Blair, Rats &
- Fred Cline has an interesting and informative reminiscence of Mary Blair on his blog. This entry is a letter Fred wrote to John Canemaker who was researching his book on Mary Blair. The letter talks about Fred’s first meeting with the Blairs and continues on through to her death and funeral.
John’s book The Art and Flair of Mary Blair is the last word on this brilliant artist. (The photo to the left comes from the book. It shows Ms. Blair painting in South America in 1941.)
Fred World is developing into an excellent blog, so I’d suggest you keep atuned to it.
(Click any image to enlarge.)
Ratatouille had a successful opening in the US. Just not as successful as Disney/Pixar might have hoped for. It opened on Friday with a $16.6 million opening to lead the box office (including the new Bruce Willis Die Hard movie). The important first weekend comes in at $47.2 million. That’s a bit lower than analysts had predicted. Unfortunately, this doesn’t equal the opening weekend of ANY other PIXAR film, and it’s likely to end up being one of their lowest grossing films. Thus it stands up to last week’s commentary from Jim Hill and Michael Barrier (see Two Days Away). the PixaRatatouille takes Manhattan.
Jim Hillcontinues the conversation today about the prospects
for the box office suggesting it’s still too soon to write things off. Indeed.
Personally, I think to some extent all this is irrelevant. Brad Bird has pulled off an amazing feat. Technically this is the greatest achievement of
the Pixar films. The animation is the finest, the technology is top notch, the design is excellent. I encourage you to see it as long as you don’t squirm at the sight of dozens of rats running around kitchens. Brad Bird deserves all the congratulations he’s been garnering regardless of the grosses (which are still high and make the film a financial success). It’s an enormous achievement he’s pulled off.
By the way you can follow a complete week by week comparative breakdown of Ratatouille against all of the other Pixar films here.
I very much like that this film has generated such positive commentary about animation from within and outside the community. Reviewers nhave written some of their best on this animated film. A.O. Scott‘s review in last Friday’s NYTimes is a good example. (The Times also has an audio slide show with an interview with Brad Bird.) Many of the blogs are lighting up with positive comments. Michael Barrier led the way after he’d seen a preview. He also continues with additional comments. Jenny Lerew at Blackwing Diaries writes an excellent piece giving us a nice view of LA studios. There are many others from Cartoon Brew to Will Finn.
On a completely different note, Larry T. on his blog, Random Semiconscious Musings, has a great post on Mother Goose Goes Hollywood wherein he identifies all of the caricatures with matching photographs. It’s great to see the likes of Ned Sparks (pictured), George Arliss and Joe Penner.
Thanks, Larry.
on 03 Jul 2007 at 12:36 pm 1.David Nethery said …
Thanks for the link to Larry T.’s blog. I had seen his blog before , but apparently had not bookmarked it because I haven’t come across it in a long time.
I like “Mother Goose Goes Hollywood” and most of the caricatures are successful, but a few of them are pretty lame. The Fats Waller caricature is very disappointing to me as a Fats Waller fan . Fats had very distinctive, fine facial features, especially his eyes and his mouth, but the design used in this film is just a standard stereotypical “mush mouth” and standard cartoon eyes. Doesn’t really look like Fats Waller . I also question the one that is identified as Joan Blondell. I could have sworn that was supposed to be Mae West. It doesn’t read as Joan Blondell to my eyes at all. But a lot of them are dead on, like Hugh Herbert and Ned Sparks. I knew those wonderful character actors from cartoons before I ever saw them in the live action movies. I remember as a kid I was fascinated by the sour-puss character that appeared in several cartoons (this one, Avery’s “Hollywood Steps Out” , probably others) , but I never knew who he was supposed to be until later on I saw “Gold Diggers of ’33″ and “42nd Street” at a revival theater and there he was , Ned Sparks. I thought to myself : “A-ha! It’s that guy .”
I finally got the joke.
Overall I prefer “Hollywood Steps Out” but both of them are among my favorites.
on 05 Jul 2007 at 6:42 am 2.Stephen said …
You can find a few examples of Mary Blair’s work in “Treasures of Disney Animation Art” Her work should be called a treasure.