Update: And in case you hadn’t heard, Disney revealed today that Brad Bird is working on “The Incredibles 2.”
The days of Pixar confidently releasing one beautiful and original animated film after another are long gone. Sequels which were once just the domain of the “Toy Story” franchise, have now spread to “Monsters Inc,” “Cars” and “Finding Nemo,” even while standalone pics like the recent “Brave” don’t quite capture the magic of earlier efforts. And it seems Pixar isn’t done yet morphing into a machine that seems more concerned these days about re-branding and exploiting their popular properties.
At the 3D Creative Summit in London, Pixar’s director of 3D production Josh Hollander revealed that the company is planning three-dimensional re-releases of basically all their popular movies. “Right now we’re working on ‘The Incredibles,’ which is a lot of fun in 3D. I’m not sure what the release strategy for it will be,” he said, adding: “We have a version of ‘Ratatouille,’ which works really well in 3D and we’re trying to figure out exactly what the release strategy for that will be.”
And that’s not all.
Screen Daily adds in their report that “3D re-issues of ‘Toy Story‘ and ‘Toy Story 2‘ as well as ‘Finding Nemo’ and ‘Monsters Inc’ ” are also in the pipeline. And ironically, Hollander acknowledges that excessive use of the format is making audiences tire of putting on the glasses at all.
“I think that we as an industry may have lost some of our audience for 3D with releases that didn’t beg for the medium or didn’t warrant the medium or didn’t use the median in a nuanced and sophisticated and comfortable way,” said Hollander, who hopes that ticket buyers will once be optimistic for 3D, even as Pixar’s re-release plans seem to be the very thing audiences are weary of.
So, while you keep waiting for that “The Incredibles” sequel, will seeing it again in 3D be enough to tide you over?