Select theaters were showing Ratatouille a couple of weeks before the actual release for one night, one screening only. I got to go to one of them and I wonder if they’ll do the same for WALL•E.
Do you mean a 9 minute preview?
No. Two weeks before Ratatouille was officially released, some theaters showed the entire film for one screening. Do you think Pixar would do it again with WALL•E?
I hope they do. 
I loved going to the one for Ratatouille; makes you feel special.
I hope there’s no 9-minute preview - I’d have to resist the temptation to see it.
Well, I hope there are special “sneak previews” (as they are called over here), where the film is shown a full week or two before release. I think it worked quite well with Ratatouille because it gave time for word of mouth to go around and give the film a good reputation before its official release date. It would also means us Pixar fans would get to see it earlier than normal, which is always a good thing. 
I know this thread isn’t about this, but I think it would be a good idea for Pixar to release another 9-minute-preview online of WALL•E. They would have to be selective about what part(s) to show as to not give the story away, though. Personally, I don’t know if I would watch an Internet preview since I don’t want anything spoiled, and I felt like I knew so much about Ratatouille before going on seeing it, which ruined some of the surprises for me… But from a marketing standpoint, it’s a great idea. I think a lot of people are drooling over this film already, so if they did this it would make them more eager to see it.
Well, 9 min clip again would be fun to see. I enjoyed seeing the Ratatouille one. And a sneak preview would be awesome if I could get a chance to see it. Most likely though it’ll end up being on a saturday which is a day I almost always work.
I’m not sure if they will, I think that screening’s of Ratatouille before the official release where done to make people advertise the film by mouth to others so they can attract more people to watch the movie. Seeing how Disney riped off Pixar when marketing Ratatouille and how hectic the movie industry was last year, I’m sure they will not do early screening’s of WALL-E, but there is a possible chance of them doing it again. It would be nice if they do it again for WALL-E
My own feeling (and this is just my own opinion; I have no inside information on this) is that Disney did the 9-minute preview of “Ratatouille” because the movie was hard to market and explain to people in a quick 30-second commercial way. Also, because of the subject matter (rats) you couldn’t have McDonalds and Wendys and other such marketing partners pumping up the marketing machine too. Wall-E is more “normal” a movie (from a marketing standpoint) in which I’m sure there will be tons of cross-promotion from Disney’s partners. Because of this, there probably won’t be the need for something like the 9-minute clip.
As far as doing a “sneak preview night”… yes, there was one for Ratatouille. I personally think it was done for the same reason above (to spread awareness and good word of mouth on a picture that couldn’t be marketed in the traditional Disney way) … as to whether they’ll do it for Wall-E? I don’t think they need to (there’s already strong awareness and word-of-mouth – with good reason) but it certainly wouldn’t hurt the picture to do so. I think a lot also depends on how crowded the opening weekend for Wall-E is – if it will be going against a slew of other films, there’s more of a reason to do a sneak the week before.
Last year, I was fortunate enough to see Ratatouille at Pixar a few weeks before the release and I am pleased to say that I received my invitation to see Wall E at Pixar on June 12th.
If you can donate $250 or more to the Emeryville Education Fund, I would highly recommend the investment.
You can expect me to share my experience with Pixar Planet as I did last year when I saw Ratatouille.
Stay tuned!
I think they should to the early airs again. I mean, they sold out last time here. If the did so well financially, why not?
I had the idea that that week-early screening of ‘Ratatouille’ were some executives getting ‘cold feet’ about the film coming out. Generally, PIXAR films don’t have early sneak previews a week in advance.
However, if there is an early sneak of Wall-E I’m gonna try to get there if I can: this film is my must-see of the summer. And every theater that has a preview, there’s always 3-7 people that say ‘Wah-ah-el-ee!’ along with Wall-E at the end of the trailer.
Just in case there doesn’t end up being any advance screenings, since people seem to be hyped up about WALL•E anyway, I’ve added a couple of advance screening competition details to the WALL•E Competitions thread - so check them out and enter if you really want to see the movie before the release date.
I would love to see an early showing of Wall-E. I didn’t get to see the early showing of Ratatouille last year…
Oh, by the way, Wall-E is everywhere! Living in the Bay Area, where both Pixar and PDI Dreamworks headquarters are, I cannot stop but noticing all of the Wall-E ads. In San Francsico’s bus system, Wall-E covers ENTIRE buses from front to back. Since so much of the city takes the bus, it’s going to be hard to avoid Wall-E. I drove through Redwood City today (PDI Dreamworks hometown) and loved the Wall-E ads taking over the city, with no Kung Fu Panda to be seen. There are billboards at every bus stop, on freeways. Most impressive was the Wall-E billboard next to the “Emeryville: Next Exit” sign in Emeryville. I wish I could have gotten a picture of that!
Kung Fu Smothered.
The designs of the panda movie look nice, but lack the sophistication and storytelling depth of what we’ve seen in Wall-e so far. I think the panda movie will do pretty well, and may finally sell dreamworks some toys–which none of their films have done well to date.
And then Wall-e will leave tread marks all over it.
I was watching the news a couple of weeks ago and there was a report from Hollywood (I forget what the news story was about) and for a second there was a cut-out billboard of WALL•E - it only took me a millisecond to recognise him and yell “Hey, that’s WALL•E!” Not sure where exactly the billboard was in Hollywood, but it was a nice surprise to see him pop up in an unexpected place on TV, especially as there is zero coverage of the movie in Australia right now.
I actually heard that it was surprisingly good. But yeah, Dreamworks < PIXAR IMO.
But I’m getting off topic. Man I wish they’d do a sneak preview night again.