As I pointed out in my last article about Brad Bird’s future live-action project, it’s been a long time since we’ve heard anything new about the epic, disaster, love story set in San Francisco.
This begs the question, whatever happened to 1906? Jim Hill speculates on the answer.
With an ambitious script, a need for a huge budget and our tough economic times, 1906 is a hard sell. All that, combined with having to please three studios (Warner Bros., Disney and Pixar) has Brad Bird in a pinch. The article enlightens us on what exactly is taking this movie so long to start official production and compares it to Titanic. That’s where the problem comes in, studios don’t have the safety at these times for a titanic budget, which is required for a film of this scale.
Read the full article over here, it’s even got a little tidbit about a prospective sequel to a movie about a certain family of super heroes…
Last modified: February 10, 2009
Someone on the IMDb forums said that 1906 was going to be filmed at Fox Studios in Sydney, Australia. I’m not sure how true that is. Maybe they are scouting for locations at the moment.
This movie seems to have been stuck in development hell for quite some time now. I would love for it to be made by Pixar and directed by Brad Bird, along with Warner Bros. or whichever studio they end up going with. It would be a shame for Pixar to waste all of this time and money trying to get this film off the ground and it doesn’t end up happening, especially as Brad seems to feel a connection with this material. But if there’s any Pixar director to against two studios at once, it would be him.
It would be good if Brad could simultaneously work on both 1906 and The Incredibles 2. That movie badly needs a sequel and it’s taking forever! But judging by the production of The Incredibles, he’s a one-movie-at-a-time kind of guy.
Just a reminder, take EVERYTHING that hack jim hill writes on with a large grain of salt. Half of that “article” is well known, the other half wild speculation by someone (hill) who doesn’t know a hill of beans about what he’s talking about. I like fan sites as much as anyone, but I thought this site was above posting badly written conjecture by someone like jim hill. Here’s hoping you scrap this article/links altogether.
Good point, Rachelcakes! He’s a non-entity, constantly trying to prove his importance. I’ve read him enough to know not to.
I didn’t make that point, another Anon did. 😉
Upcoming Pixar used to post and link to Jim Hill articles, then they stopped… Even though he is an animation veteran I really don’t believe anything he says any more. He’s so anti-Pixar it’s not even funny. I would like to know exactly why he holds that attitude. Maybe sometime in the past John Lasseter cut in front of him in line, who knows? =D
Thanks for posting this guys. I was wondering what happened to this project. I remember the writer for this (for got his name) coming to Cinequest in San Jose and talking up how this would be a tentpole release for summer 2006. It seemed like they were inent to release it then, being the 100-year mark and all, but I’ve often wondered where it went.
To bad I don’t have half a bill sitting around cuz if I did I’d finance it myself and be pretty confident of getting at least x3 that back in the long run.
I read about this news on Jim Hill’s site a few days ago….
So let me get this straight: The Walt Disney Company, who was well and able to splurge over $200 million on Chicken Little, are hesitant to fund Brad Bird’s equally ambitious project? This is Brad Bird we’re talking about here — the guy who shelled out such box office hits/productions as “The Incredibles” and “Ratatouille” — and it’s reported that Disney Studios, along with Warner Bros. (I’m leaving Pixar out of this since they already have enough hits to their name at the present time), is unwilling to support what may possibly be a huge success in the entertainment industry, even after they’ve admitted that this project (“1906”) will most likely garner a significant pool of dough? I’m fully aware that the economy currently sucks — heck, I can testify of it — , and if Brad’s having story problems then that’s different (although I’m sure it’s nothing he can’t fix), but why are the aforementioned studios suddenly so afraid to spend millions on talent when they know the results will be profitable? I don’t get it. Poor Brad….