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In 2007, Leslie Iwerks unlocked the digital doorway to the world's most successful and prolific computer animation studio with her documentary THE PIXAR STORY. A thorough and thoroughly entertaining study of Pixar's company history and legacy, Iwerks' six-year project did not get the recognition it deserved in its limited release, but happily the Starz premium channel is now airing THE PIXAR STORY and anyone who appreciates the talent behind these digital tales should definitely see this film.
This documentary's main strength is its complete access to Pixar's animation concept art for hit films like TOY STORY and candid interviews with the artists who created them. Indeed, the art of animation beats at the heart of Iwerks' film: this is not a short press kit video promoting Pixar's latest hit, nor is it a dissection of the studio politics which recently kept Pixar in the headlines as often as their theatrical releases.
Much like the wonderful tales told by this digital dream factory, THE PIXAR STORY focuses simply and effectively on the main characters and life stories they have to share with audiences. As with Pixar's previous hits, this strategy is a winning combination for writer-director-producer Leslie Iwerks as well.
At the center of this story are a small band of the unlikeliest heroes: animator and chief visionary officer John Lasseter, computer science mastermind Ed Catmull, and funding entrepreneur Steve Jobs. It is the convergence of these three specific personalities and skillsets which created the first ambitious Pixar dreams two decades ago, and have since nurtured this digital dynasty into one of the greatest successes in cinematic history.
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THE PIXAR STORY debuted on Starz April 22, 2008 and will be shown again on several of the
Starz premium and on-demand channels over the following dates (check local listings for time):
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Starz: May 3,11 and June 27
Starz Edge: May 6,7,11,12 Starz in Black: May 12
Starz Kids & Family: May 18,19,27,28,31 and June 24,25 |
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Narrated by Stacy Keach, THE PIXAR STORY weaves together two tales of ambition: a forward-thinking pod of tech-heads inventing computer graphics while harboring an unrequited love of animation, and a CalArts student animator telling stories which begged to expand beyond the confines of their paper margins.
Ed Catmull created the very first crude 3D computer animation sequence ever featured in a film: a simple wireframe view of a human hand which briefly appeared in FUTUREWORLD. This short loop was state-of-the-art from an engineering standpoint, but Catmull and his team longed to create actual character animation, which was far beyond the capacity of their tools and artistic talent. |
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Simultaneously, John Lasseter parlayed the success of his award-winning student films at CalArts into a position at the Walt Disney Studio as a staff animator. While his work with other future Disney mainstays like Glen Keane served Disney animated features well, their ambitions for technically expanding the artform met strong resistance from the old guard and entrenched mindset of the studio. Disney's TRON finally crystallized the potential of computer animation for Lasseter, but his own short film project intended to marry CG technology with traditional hand-animated characters was again squashed. Computer animation was misunderstood as a threat to classic animation by those who couldn't foresee its potential as a potent tool in an artist's hands, and Disney didn't renew Lasseter's contract. His feature film dreams were effectively erased before his eyes.
Depressed, Lasseter moped around a Long Beach computer conference in 1983 where Ed Catmull was representing a tiny techno-research lab under the wing of Lucasfilm in Northern California. Producing animated films was still the lofty but unreachable goal of Catmull and his group, who had produced little more for owner George Lucas but a computer graphics software system (dubbed Pixar) which wasn't selling. Catmull jumped at the chance to hire Lasseter, the only true animator they could entice out of the Disney culture to help the Pixar division take its next evolutionary step into the future.
Enter the final member of the troika, Apple computer owner and young multimillionaire Steve Jobs, who was the only investor to recognize Pixar's technical value and artistic vision. Jobs bought out Pixar for $10 million to create a stand-alone company with the mission to create computer-generated animation as its own commercial artform. While a string of highly-praised and award-winning short films ensued, including LUXO JR. and TIN TOY among others, Jobs was still losing a million dollars a year on his investment. Yet he never lost sight of Pixar's long term potential, and eventually Lasseter pitched a half-hour holiday TV special to his former employer Disney Studios, which had attempted to hire him back as a director several times. Finally the Burbank corporation recognized Lasseter's digital dream, and greenlit the project as a full-length feature film instead.
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The end result after exhaustive technical development, hand labor and unfaltering love of animation was TOY STORY, Disney/Pixar's global mega-hit, and of course the rest was history as Catmull and Lasseter's ten-year struggle to re-invent animation suddenly made them overnight sensations. Yet the worldwide box office hit TOY STORY was, in reality, only the beginning of Pixar's trials and tribulations as a company always riding the fine line between exaltation and extinction. The pressure to recapture lightning in a bottle for their second do-or-die feature quadrupled the dramatic and artistic difficulties going forward.
Iwerks' film visually presents Pixar's entire history in hundreds of never-before-seen stills of concept art, character designs and animation tests which will delight all fans of the studio and artform. This treasure trove of behind-the-scenes material, including interviews with voice actors Tom Hanks and Tim Allen, is so expansive that these rare glimpses of Pixar's hidden history demand a second viewing of the documentary just to appreciate the artwork alone. |
Through interviews with all the key Pixar figures plus other directors, producers, animators and performers, THE PIXAR STORY unfolds as a triumphant victory which almost didn't happen. As the mark of a great documentary, Iwerks tells Pixar's famous tale by creating interest and suspense about events despite us already knowing how they end. Pixar's unfaltering chain of box office hits with A BUG'S LIFE, TOY STORY 2, FINDING NEMO and onward prove to be hair-raising, risky gambles by the storytellers and studio. The only sure thing in Hollywood is that there is no sure thing, and the same rule definitely applies to this Bay Area anomaly of cinematic success. Iwerks not only illustrates how these artists crafted such animated classics on paper and pixels, but also details the interplay of creative and corporate personalities which shaped Pixar's explosive growth and partnership with Disney Studios.
Buzz Lightyear, Woody, Nemo and Mr. Incredible aren't the only heroes of animation in THE PIXAR STORY, and Leslie Iwerks provides fascinating insights about John Lasseter, Ed Catmull, Steve Jobs and their creative partners. This highly entertaining film which will have audiences saying "I didn't know that" with delight every few minutes as they learn more about the minds and hearts breathing life into these films. Fans of classic animation, either in two or three dimensions, hand drawn or pixel powered, should seek out and enjoy THE PIXAR STORY on the various Starz premium channels over the next month. Iwerks' film undoubtedly merits a future and full-scale release on DVD to entertain an even broader audience of all ages who remain inspired by this new golden age of animation. For this documentary underscores the happy hope that the Pixar story is indeed only beginning. |
