

When she sings as herself, she touches the boy she wants to help and her grieving heart, too.īecause Japanese animated features are made by smaller crews and on smaller budgets than those of major American films, directors can present more personal visions. To save the boys, Suzu discards Belle’s glamorous trappings and reveals herself to be the plain high school girl she is. The beast that Suzu encounters in U is not an enchanted prince, but Kei, an abused adolescent who struggles to protect his younger brother from their brutal father. American heroines may express a longing for a vanished parent, but not the deep, complicated emotions of this reworking of “Beauty and the Beast.” The protagonist of the Disney version misses her father when she agrees to become Beast’s prisoner, but she never mentions her mother. Suzu misses her, but she’s also angry at her for sacrificing herself for “a kid whose name she didn’t even know.” Suzu went so far as to abandon her impressive musical gifts because her mother encouraged them. In real life, Suzu is an introverted high school student in a flyspeck town - even her best friend calls her “a country bumpkin.” But she still wins sophisticated listeners, as her music reflects the love and pain she has experienced, especially since the death of her mother, who drowned saving a child from a flooded river. Like many teenagers, Suzu in Mamoru Hosoda’s “Belle” (released here this year and available on major digital platforms) has a life online that overshadows her daily existence: her alter ego, the title character, is the reigning pop diva of the cyberworld of U. They’re not properties or franchises they’re characters the filmmakers believe in. They have faults and weaknesses and tempers as well as strengths and talents.
We are strong together animation series#
“Did I Do That to the Holidays: A Steve Urkel Story,” with Jaleel White reprising his iconic role and Wyatt Cenec writing and executive producing, was also canceled, as well as “The Amazing World of Gumball: The Movie.” The latter, directed by Ben Bocquelet and written by Shane Mack, was meant to be a bridge from the original “The Amazing World of Gumball” series and a new show called “Amazing World of Gumball: The Series” (we can’t make this up).At a time of widespread debate over the depiction of women in film, the top Japanese animators have long been creating heroines who are more layered and complex than many of their American counterparts. previously very bullish about the project.) They were doing a number from “Little Shop of Horrors.” What could possibly be better? (This one was very far along and footage was screened during this past summer’s Annecy Festival in France, with Warner Bros.
We are strong together animation movie#
There was also “Bye Bye Bunny,” a big, animated jukebox musical that was written by Ariel Dumas, a head writer for “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.” The movie was set on Broadway. On the “Looney Tunes” side, there was “The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes” movie, written by Kevin Costello, which had a science fiction bent and saw Porky and Daffy uncovering an alien conspiracy. Additionally, “Merry Little Batman,” a Christmastime animated feature from executive producer/director Mike Roth and writer Morgan Evans, was a kind of Batman-ified version of “Home Alone,” with Damien Wayne in Wayne Manor alone for the holidays who has to defend his castle against intruders.


“Batman: The Caped Crusader,” from Reeves, Abrams, Brubaker and “Batman: The Animated Series” vet Bruce Timm, was described at a recent DC fan event as “more ‘Batman: The Animated Series’ than ‘Batman: The Animated Series,’” promising to lean into that aesthetic and sensibility in a big way. Why Has HBO Max Pulled All Those Original Shows and Movies? It’s Complicated
