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Netflix's new animated series include shows based on the graphic novel "Hilda," the videogame Skylanders, and the Dreamworks feature "Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron."

The post Netflix Announces 6 New Animated Series appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

The producers of the French hit "Intouchables" are aiming for their first animation success.

The post ‘Ballerina’ Teaser Released; Weinstein Co. Will Distribute In The U.S. appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

Reports are emerging that the Weinstein Company may delay the release of "Underdogs" for the third time.

The Weinstein Company has released the American trailer for "Underdogs," which it will release into U.S. theaters on April 10, 2015.

The Weinstein Company has acquired the rights to distribute Foosball in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and France. The film was directed by Oscar-winning filmmaker Juan José Campanella (The Secret in Their Eyes) and originally released in Argentina in July 2013 as Metegol. The film bears the dual distinction of being a huge hit on its home soil (it was the third-highest grossing film in Argentina last year), and also, with its $21 million budget, the most expensive film to be made in Argentina, animated or otherwise. The Weinstein Company has re-titled the film Underdogs and will give its new English dub a release date of August 27, 2014. The company is not known for its animation-savvy, although it has distributed some reasonably-performing animated pieces in the past decade like Escape from Planet Earth and Hoodwinked! Those are accompanied by a string of critical and box office failures that date back to its Miramax era (Doogal, The Thief and the Cobbler, Freddie as F.R.o.7., anyone?). With all of the positive buzz generated by Foosball, this looks to be an above-average pickup for the Weinstein Company. (source: Variety)

In its fifth weekend at the American box office, the Weinstein Company’s Escape from Planet Earth grossed an estimated $2.3 million, which was good enough for a 10th place finish. Its grand total now stands at $52.2 million, nudging it ahead of Hoodwinked as the top-grossing Weinstein animated pic. Hoodwinked earned $51.4 million when it was released in 2005.

Other VFX-heavy films in this week’s top 10 include Disney’s first-place finisher Oz The Great and Powerful, which captured $42.2M in its second weekend for a total of $145M, and Warner Bros/New Line’s $200-million mega-flop Jack the Giant Slayer, which picked up $6.2M in its 3rd weekend for a total of $53.9M.

A Brew reader who preferred to remain anonymous e-mailed his thoughts about this week’s lawsuit filed against The Weinstein Company and Rainmaker Entertainment. This reader, who worked at Rainmaker Entertainment on the aborted feature, feels that the director Tony Leech, who is currently suing The Weinstein Company and Rainmaker, is partly responsible for the mess. I don’t think anybody truly knows who deserves the lion’s share of the blame, but as I hinted at earlier, it does appear that every party involved exhibited incompetence to some degree:

I was working on the Escape from Planet Earth production a few years back, while Tony Leech was on-board. Reading your latest article on the TWC [The Weinstein Company] lawsuit I had to write and provide some inside perspective.

While at Rainmaker, I read through at least 2 major rewrites and countless adjustments to the script and let me be crystal clear, Tony Leech produced some of the worst writing I had the displeasure of reading in my career.

You can’t really blame TWC, pushing for rewrites as I’m sure they were as frustrated with the underwhelming results. His inexperience as noted by TWC is a very accurate description. As a “director”, not seeing the big picture or having a vision, micro managing, and the occasional public meltdown made everyone feel like they had to walk on eggshells around Tony. You can imagine how counterproductive the situation was to improving the movie.

I recall talking to the head of the story development, a talented storyboard artist, who was frustrated for not being able to contribute a single meaningful idea to the script due to Tony’s inability to collaborate on any level. He left the project soon after.

In hindsight, perhaps the biggest TWC mistake was not negotiating Tony off the project earlier. Some major spending could have been avoided.

The stories go on and on and every day was a comedy of errors. I personally had enough after 6 months and left, I felt sorry for my friends, pouring their hearts into a production that was going nowhere. Hopefully this helps shed some light on the subject. Thanks for a great website, I visit CB often and every time it’s a treat:)

Cartoon Brew: Leading the Animation Conversation | Permalink | 2 comments | Post tags: Brian Inerfeld, Escape from Planet Earth, Rainmaker Entertainment, The Weinstein Company, Tony Leech