Okay, bear in mind, this is an Indian startup company partnership with a relatively independent American studio, so they don’t have as many resources, expertise or experience as the big boys. If I was told Dreamworks or Blue Sky had made this, I would be critical, because from their previous films it was clear they had the assets and resources (not to mention the budgets) to pull off more convincing-looking simulations/characters/background sets. I’m willing to condemn Shrek Goes Fourth/Forever After/The Final Chapter/4 because I know they have the capability to do better from films like KFP and HTTYD. This is their first animated film, so I think we should give these guys a break in the animation department (And in case you checked, I did mention I can overlook the ‘Spyro graphics’ in my previous post).
Secondly, I have mentioned this before, but the Newt argument doesn’t fly here. I did a little rant in the ‘What the heck is this?!’ thread that there’s some hypocrisy going on here about criticizing Rio and Alpha and Omega for having similar plots to Newt. This may be true, but it’s not a valid argument against it. For all we know, they could’ve gone into production at the same time (Surf’s Up for example, was decried as a Happy Feet rip-off, even though both simultaneously went into production). And really, Pixar doesn’t have a monopoly on originality, I can cite a couple of examples where Pixar directors may have been ‘inspired’ by previous movies, indirectly or not.
Brad Bird for example, said some people asked him if he had watched Watchmen while making Incredibles. Andrew Stanton has also been asked similarly about Short Circuit while making Wall-E. And Pete Docter actually said he conceived the idea for Up while doing the English dub of Howl’s Moving Castle, and after watching Fitzcarraldo.
The only thing I’m going to berate about Alpha and Omega is the juvenille humour, but after the ‘lincoln log’ joke in the Toy Story 3 trailer, I think I can say Pixar is not immune to it either.
I’d have to see more footage to be convinced, since the character relationships are in place, and the storyline’s okay. Yes, they could do with less cornball humour. But I’m not writing them off just because they’re the ‘underdog’ of the industry (pun unintended).
I’m sorry for the rant, but I’m no above accepting other films on their own merits.
Never seen Twilight, so I couldn’t say anything about that. Wolves are ok.
?
