Simon Wells
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McDowell played Wells as the inventor who used his machine to hunt Jack the Ripper through time called Time After Time.
The Ten Commandments (1956)
Directed by Cecil B. DeMille
influenced The Prince of Egypt (1998)
Plot Visuals
But in Rameses, in him we can see the pain of being abandoned by a loved one, and while reducing the Exodus story to "Pharaoh was upset at Moses and took it out on the Hebrews" is terribly theology, it's remarkably compelling drama (this is all ultimately taken from the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments , but the DreamWorks version is infinitely more intimate than DeMille's starchy melodrama).
The tale has inspired countless plays, a renowned oratorio (Handel's "Israel in Egypt"), and one of the most beloved epic motion pictures of all time (Cecil B. De Mille's The Ten Commandments).
No one is denying that the parting of the red sea scene from "The Ten Commandments" is a powerful special effect (especially for it's time).
To back up a bit, Togo tells “the untold true story” of a sled dog who was not Balto but did run in the same relay as the dog made famous in part by the animated 1995 film, Balto (which, for what it’s worth, was a Universal film and not a Disney film).
The 1925 diphtheria outbreak in Nome, Alaska, had already been adapted for cinema in Simon Wells’ 1995 animated film Balto .
If the serum run sounds familiar, it formed the basis of Amblin’s 1995 animated feature Balto .
The Disney+ original joins a long line of classic predecessors like “Balto,” “Iron Will,” “White Fang,” and a ballooning number of “Call of the Wild” adaptations (another one is on the way next year, starring Harrison Ford), though this one has a bit more on its mind than the rest of its doggy brethren.
You may already know parts of this story, thanks to a dog named Balto.
What do Homeward Bound , Eight Below , Balto and upcoming The Call of the Wild have in common with the latest live-action film to debut on Disney+?
Inspired by a 2007 children's book by "Bloom County" creator Berkeley Breathed, "Mars Needs Moms" — the title is a clever nod to an infamous 1966 sci-fi film, "Mars Needs Women" — finds a young boy, Milo, hitching a ride on a Martian rocket after his mom (Cusack) is abducted by aliens who use a sort of brain zapper to suck out the personality of human mothers so the moms' "discipline" instinct can be transplanted into the Martian nannybots.
One of the film's final images is a half-lift from the somewhat kitschy William Cameron Menzies -directed classic " Invaders From Mars ," which exploits childhood trauma in a way that surely inspired Breathed's vision.
Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014)
Directed by Ridley Scott
influenced by The Prince of Egypt (1998)
Plot
It's one thing to compare it to the bloated DeMille picture, but this isn't even as smart or comprehensive in its storytelling choices as DreamWorks Animation's 99-minute cartoon musical The Prince of Egypt (which remains, against all odds, the most satisfying cinematic treatment of the story to date).
In this humble reviewer’s opinion, the beautiful, criminally underrated animated film The Prince of Egypt , from 1998, is the only Exodus movie we need.
Borrowing much of its dynamic from 1998’s The Prince of Egypt , also dealing heavily with the kinship between Moses and Ramses, Exodus hones in on the dichotomy and tension inherent in Moses’ predicament; he’s a regarded member of a great dynasty, but his heritage lies with the people whose backs are being broken to build that dynasty.
Unlike Cecil B DeMille's classic “The Ten Commandments” (1956) or the animated “The Prince of Egypt” (1998), it’s not funny or campy enough to be purely entertaining.
I mean, even “The Prince of Egypt,” the 1998 animated musical take on the material that nobody seems to appreciate or even remember, told the story better.
"Exodus: Gods and Kings" has a flurry of undeniable technical merits and two fine central turns from Bale and Edgerton, but how successful can a sprawling live-action spectacle really be when it predominately makes one wish he or she was revisiting 1998's superior animated film, " The Prince of Egypt ," instead?
It's a social structure with echoes of "The Time Machine," "Metropolis," and John Boorman 's whacked-out "Zardoz."
One thinks of not just the Occupy movement but the division between the working and wealthy classes that inspired such past science-fiction classics as Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" and H.G. Wells' "The Time Machine."
Our hero’s fondness for rare post-apocalyptic plant life and women with a strict work ethic can’t help but remind one of “Wall-E,” while the sight of a shattered moon often looming over the horizon finally gives one cause to recall 2002’s update of “The Time Machine.”
The Road to El Dorado (2000)
Directed by Bibo Bergeron
influenced by The Prince of Egypt (1998)
Visuals
But a merely adequate effort is somewhat disappointing coming from DreamWorks, the studio that had so spectacularly redefined the barriers of feature animation with their 1998 epic The Prince of Egypt .
It's not as quirky as " Antz " or as grown up as " The Prince Of Egypt " but as silly fun it does nicely, and no wonder: Its directors are Disney veterans, and the soundtrack includes such effective cartoon voices as Kevin Kline , Kenneth Branagh , Armand Assante , Edward James Olmos and the unsinkable Rosie Perez .
This film, under the freshman directing team of animators Bibo Bergeron and Will Finn, and visual effects specialist Don Paul (Pocahontas, The Prince Of Egypt), immerses the viewer with vivid color and awe-inspiring artwork from the first frame.
Given the massive level of hype generated by DreamWorks Studios for its previous animated features, Antz and The Prince of Egypt, the relative lack of buzz for its latest venture, The Road to El Dorado, is more than a little suspicious.
The images are pretty, but lack the breathtaking awe of Tarzan or The Prince of Egypt.
Avatar (2009)
Directed by James Cameron
influenced by Mars Needs Moms (2011), The Time Machine (2002)
Visuals
The Marines are now the despoiling enemy and the aliens the good guys, and thrown into the mix are references to King Kong, Planet of the Apes and Bambi and echoes of HG Wells's The Time Machine.
And then there's the less-than-beguiling, dead-eye motion-capture animation -- provided by actors hooked up to computer sensors -- that has worked better in live-action films like "Avatar" than in 'toons.
This technology explains how actor Andy Serkis "became" Gollum for director Peter Jackson, and how Zoe Saldana portrayed Neytiri of the Na'vi in "Avatar."
While motion capture may yet prove to be the future of cinema, here’s hoping that the next generation of mo-cap moviemakers take their cue from Beowulf, Avatar and even A Christmas Carol rather than Mars Needs Moms.
Still, some viewers have expressed a visceral disdain for the format, likening the blank-eyed human characters to walking corpses, which is why non-humans, like the Na'vi in "Avatar" and the aliens in "Mars Needs Moms," fare better.
Its craftsmanship showcases the latest in performance-capture technology (à la "Avatar").
The process has also lost those weirdly inhuman faces that plagued The Polar Express, Zemeckis’ first foray into performance capture.
It's only the occasional unnatural look of the motion-capture animation that is still a stumbling block for producer Robert Zemeckis and the team that created "The Polar Express" and "A Christmas Carol."
The point of "performance capture animation " – the expensive process by which live actors are turned into semi-animated characters – entirely escapes me and is no more interesting here than in The Polar Express or Disney's A Christmas Carol, Robert Zemeckis's earlier uses of the technique.
Produced by "Christmas Carol" director Robert Zemeckis with direction credited to Simon Wells (H.G.'s great-grandson, who helmed the ill-fated live-action 2002 remake of "The Time Machine"), the movie has some impressive imagery referencing "Star Wars" and (like Zemeckis' notorious "The Polar Express") the Nazi documentary "Triumph of the Will."
As motion-capture technology advances and produces more and more films, the startlingly realistic animation it produces is no longer as occasionally disturbing as it was when The Polar Express was released.
A more relevant technology is revealed during the movie's end credits, which offer a behind-the-scenes look at the "performance capture" process used to create this latest computer-animated production from Robert Zemeckis, the filmmaker who helped pioneer the technique with 2004's "The Polar Express."
(He got some help from Gore Verbinski, director of "The Mexican."
Simon Wells -- great-grandson of H.G. Wells -- directed most of the film, with Gore Verbinski ( "The Mexican," "Mouse Hunt") taking over for the last couple weeks of shooting.
For not only did he reportedly suffer from physical exhaustion while shooting the film (with an uncredited Gore Verbinski - "The Mexican" - being called in to finish the last days of shooting), but he's also likely to feel ill upon seeing some critical and public reaction to his effort, or at least the second half thereof.
Perhaps this erratic editing and untidy storytelling can be attributed to the fact that Simon Wells had some kind of breakdown on the set and was replaced by director Gore Verbinski ( "The Mexican" ) for the last few weeks of shooting.
Back to the Future (1985)
Directed by Robert Zemeckis
influenced The Time Machine (2002), Mars Needs Moms (2011)
Themes
The Time Machine is so sloppy that it makes Kate and Leopold look like Back to the Future.
While the original novel was, well, novel in its day, so many time travel films have come along since then - including the "Back to the Future" and "Terminator" pictures as well as the terrific "Time After Time" - that the basic concept seems somewhat quaint, humdrum and/or basically unremarkable.
Produced by Robert Zemeckis, and using the motion-capture process championed by the Back to the Future director, Mars Needs Moms is the tale of Milo (Green and Dusky), a nine-year-old boy who constantly clashes with his overwrought mother (Joan Cusack).
The film began life simply enough, as yet another of Jeffrey Katzenberg's "fuck you so hard" gestures to his old boss and nemesis Michael Eisner; their rivalry fueled the creation of the animation studio that Katzenberg had tried to use to out-Disney Disney, beginning with 1998's dramatic musical The Prince of Egypt , DreamWorks' second feature (their first, Antz from earlier in the same year was a more petulant but also lower-key "fuck you" to Disney's handmaidens at Pixar).
Like DreamWorks’ previous animated efforts — including the more traditionally animated The Road to El Dorado and The Prince of Egypt as well as the computer-rendered Antz — Shrek is more adult in content than mainstream American animation has traditionally been.
Happily, the film taken on its own terms is nowhere near as broken as I've probably indicated so far: its biggest flaw as a movie is that it turns much too serious for its own good, though it otherwise is an entirely satisfying animated adventure story, one that would have given me pause were I a Disney exec (though it also does not suggest in any way the degree to which DreamWorks would begin stomping Disney following the release of Shrek in 2001).
As with his A Christmas Carol movie, Zemeckis paints himself into a digital corner by ignoring adults.
It's only the occasional unnatural look of the motion-capture animation that is still a stumbling block for producer Robert Zemeckis and the team that created "The Polar Express" and "A Christmas Carol."
The point of "performance capture animation " – the expensive process by which live actors are turned into semi-animated characters – entirely escapes me and is no more interesting here than in The Polar Express or Disney's A Christmas Carol, Robert Zemeckis's earlier uses of the technique.
In "The Polar Express," "Monster House," "Beowulf," "A Christmas Carol" and now "Mars Needs Moms," Zemeckis — also responsible for such cutting-edge special-effects films as "Forrest Gump" and "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" — has pursued an apparently keen interest in "performance capture" or "motion capture" filmmaking, in which actors are photographed while covered in reflective markers, so their movements and expressions can be electronically tracked and then translated into computer-generated imagery, to create animated characters.
The results, as seen in Zemeckis’s previous mo-cap features A Christmas Carol, Beowulf and The Polar Express, can charitably be described as interesting, but they’re considerably short of enchanting.
Much like “The Polar Express” and “A Christmas Carol” before it, the Zemeckis-produced “Mars” fails to deliver emotional and comedic blows thanks to the dead-eyed mannequins standing in for characters.
I suppose it’s inevitable—even the makers of both adaptations of H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine knew that the Moon falling on our heads was only good for one memorable sequence’s worth.
Trolls marks Dreamworks’ first full-on musical since The Prince of Egypt in 1998, and if this is any indication of the studio’s approach to the genre, it may be best they stay away in the future.
Produced by "Christmas Carol" director Robert Zemeckis with direction credited to Simon Wells (H.G.'s great-grandson, who helmed the ill-fated live-action 2002 remake of "The Time Machine"), the movie has some impressive imagery referencing "Star Wars" and (like Zemeckis' notorious "The Polar Express") the Nazi documentary "Triumph of the Will."
Zemeckis, a highly successful director of live-action films like “Forrest Gump,” famously switched to computer animation with live actors performing their scenes in special suits, over which animators then paint.
In "The Polar Express," "Monster House," "Beowulf," "A Christmas Carol" and now "Mars Needs Moms," Zemeckis — also responsible for such cutting-edge special-effects films as "Forrest Gump" and "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" — has pursued an apparently keen interest in "performance capture" or "motion capture" filmmaking, in which actors are photographed while covered in reflective markers, so their movements and expressions can be electronically tracked and then translated into computer-generated imagery, to create animated characters.
Lady and the Tramp (1955)
Directed by Clyde Geronimi
influenced Balto (1995), The Prince of Egypt (1998)
Plot Characters Visuals
Bridget Fonda provides the voice of a husky named Jenna for a romantic subplot that owes more than a little to Disney's "Lady and the Tramp."
Bacon and Fonda do an adequate job but, for those moviegoers who've seen "Lady and the Tramp," they're no Lady or Tramp.
This visionary sequence stands with a handful of the greatest scenes in animation film history (others would include Snow White’s flight in the enchanted forest; the mushrooms dancing to Tchaikovsky in Fantasia; Dumbo’s spectacular "Pink Elephants on Parade" number; the "Bella Notte" spaghetti kiss in Lady and the Tramp; and the ballroom sequence in Beauty and the Beast).