The year was 1975 and production was gearing up for a new animated film based upon a line of children’s books and toys that had been a favorite for generations.  The budget for the film was $4 million.  Considering that around the same time Disney only spent $1.2 million to make The Rescuers, $4 million allowed the producers to assemble a virtual all-star team of animators and filmmakers to work on the project.

The director was Abe Levitow, a man who earned his animation stripes while working under Chuck Jones, drawing iconic characters like Pepe Le Pew and Wile E. Coyote for the Looney Tunes series of shorts during their 1950’s heyday.  He also directed animated versions of Dick Tracy, Mr. Magoo, Tom and Jerry, and even worked on an Oscar-winning animated film, 1971’s A Christmas Carol.

The film’s animation was going to be overseen by the director of the same Oscar-winning A Christmas Carol, Richard Williams, who would later win an Emmy for a Ziggy cartoon special in the early 1980’s, as well as a couple more Oscars as the director of animation for Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.  Sadly, Williams had to take over directorial duties after Levitow died during the film’s production, though with his experience, he was perfectly capable of the helm.

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The year was 1975 and production was gearing up for a new animated film based upon a line of children’s books and toys that had been a favorite for generations.  The budget for the film was $4 million.  Considering that around the same time Disney only spent $1.2 million to make The Rescuers, $4 million allowed the producers to assemble a virtual all-star team of animators and filmmakers to work on the project.

The director was Abe Levitow, a man who earned his animation stripes while working under Chuck Jones, drawing iconic characters like Pepe Le Pew and Wile E. Coyote for the Looney Tunes series of shorts during their 1950’s heyday.  He also directed animated versions of Dick Tracy, Mr. Magoo, Tom and Jerry, and even worked on an Oscar-winning animated film, 1971’s A Christmas Carol.

The film’s animation was going to be overseen by the director of the same Oscar-winning A Christmas Carol, Richard Williams, who would later win an Emmy for a Ziggy cartoon special in the early 1980’s, as well as a couple more Oscars as the director of animation for Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.  Sadly, Williams had to take over directorial duties after Levitow died during the film’s production, though with his experience, he was perfectly capable of the helm.

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News arrived today that Anne Hathaway and Tom Hardy have officially been cast in the upcoming Batman movie: Dark Knight Rises. Anne Hathaway will play the role of Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman, and Tom Hardy will assume the role of Bane.

Many had speculated that Tom Hardy would be cast in Dark Knight Rises, and Anne Hathaway had been rumored to be auditioning alongside a couple of other actresses. What do you guys think of the character choices?

Click to embiggen

Yesterday was a busy day! We got a great new look at Chris Evans as Captain America, and Sony released the first photo of Andrew Garfield as Spider-Man. I guess they wanted us to see it from them as opposed to a bad photo from a cell phone.

I like it! I’m excited about a Spider-Man reboot because I was less than thrilled with the job Sam Raimi did on the first series. I think this costume makes the previous films’ costume look really bad. Granted, we haven’t seen the mask yet, but this Spider-Man definitely looks younger, leaner, and more comic-book like. Oh, and the web-shooters!

I don’t pretend to know a whole lot about this new Spider-Man reboot, but the cast and crew sound like great picks. What about you? Is your Spider-sense tingling?

Entertainment Weekly has a brand-spanking new image of Chris Evans in full Captain America costume for an upcoming issue, and we’ve got a sneak peek via a scan of the magazine image from their website. I think this costume looks great, especially considering most of the film takes place in WWII, and the plot involves Captain America being involved with the USO to some extent. It looks great and it’s a relief to see a superhero costume that’s not made out of leather for a change.

All these new images are making me really look forward to the first teaser, but what do you think?

Via SlashFilm