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Every Pixar movie, ranked — here's how 'Finding Dory' stacks up

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Not since Walt Disney has there been a figure in the animation world who has transcended the medium like John Lasseter and the studio he oversees, Pixar.

Yes, Jeffrey Katzenberg and DreamWorks Animation had their time, but for over 20 years, Lasseter's Pixar has consistently put out box-office hits (the company has earned close to $10 billion worldwide) and created stories that affect us on an emotional level that we can't wait to experience again and again.

From the "you've got a friend" tale of the "Toy Story" movies to a commentary on how we need to protect our planet in the multilayered "WALL-E," Pixar movies are much more than kids' movies or cartoons. Which is exactly how ol' Walt went about it.

Now that we've seen Pixar's latest, "Finding Dory" (out June 17), we've taken on the gargantuan task of ranking all 17 Pixar releases including "Dory"— scroll down to find out how the sequel stacks up and what's the best of them all.

SEE ALSO: 18 movies that never got a sequel but deserve one

17. 'Cars 2' (2011)

Taking Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) and Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) away from Radiator Springs and going international (plus making Mater a spy) didn't grab critics. This sequel became the first "rotten" Pixar movie on Rotten Tomatoes. Deservedly.

  



16. 'A Bug’s Life' (1998)

In the second movie ever released by Pixar, an ant named Flik (voiced by Dave Foley) sets out to find others to help save his colony against grasshoppers and ends up recruiting a unique group of allies.

Though the movie was successful at the box office, with the release of DreamWorks' "Antz" a month earlier, you're more likely to remember the Lasseter-Katzenberg feud than the films. 

 



15. 'The Good Dinosaur' (2015)

Perhaps one of the more serious stories in the Pixar inventory, this coming-of-age tale about an Apatosaurus and his human friend Spot trying to return home didn't catch on nearly as much as Pixar's other release in 2015, "Inside Out."

Burnout may have been at play here, but mostly Pixar challenged its core audience with a darker story than they were used to.

 



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Donald Trump once planned to build the largest movie studio in the US, but it fell apart

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Donald Trump

Three years before he declared his run for the presidency, Donald Trump had his eyes set on another radically ambitious personal venture — the developement of an 800-acre studio in Hampstead, Florida, which "would have been the largest film and TV production campus in America," according to The Hollywood Reporter.  

The publication details how Trump came to the idea of constructing the studio in April 2012, through his friend Joe Martinez, "a former cop and background actor... who happened to be running for mayor of Miami." Martinez proposed that Trump help him revisit an abandoned 10-year-old plan to convert an airplane hangar in Florida into a small film studio.

Trump agreed to look into it — under his own conditions.

"But Trump, being Trump, thought Martinez should think bigger," THR writes. "Instead of merely turning an old airplane hangar into a rinky-dink studio, Trump envisioned an entire studio city, built on 800 acres of undeveloped, government-owned land in Homestead — a rural, economically depressed part of Miami-Dade that still was recovering from Hurricane Andrew two decades earlier."

Trump then contracted New York architect John Fotiadis to develop renderings for the enormous Trump World Studios campus, which would have included "15 backlots, multiple sound studios ranging in size from 25,000 to 250,000 square feet (for a total of 1 million square feet of indoor space,) and even a housing complex for employees." (Fotiadis's studio blueprints can be seen in the THR article.)

As their plans started to come closer to fruition in the following months, however, Trump and his contractors then hit a series of road blocks. His team reportedly had trouble acquiring the contiguous land necessary to build the whole campus, as some properties were already purchased by other entities or already in use by the US government. 

Despite recieving a particularly memorable bit of assurance from director Michael Bay — "He told me he could have shot 'Transformers' [at Trump World Studios] if it were available,"Martinez said— the barriers to progress soon became unassailable. Martinez lost his run for mayor of Miami to a candidate who openly opposed Trump World Studios, and the studio's proposed location happened to be next to a US Air Force Reserve base, where the taking off of military jets would have made for less-than-ideal filming conditions.

"I actually said, 'Can you move the Air Force base?'" Trump admitted, according to THR.

But by November 2012, the Air Force still held its ground, and Trump's lofty project "was officially dead." 

SEE ALSO: These $180 Donald Trump piñatas are selling like crazy

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NOW WATCH: 4 things you might have missed on this week’s ‘Game of Thrones’

'Warcraft' director Duncan Jones is aware video game movies generally suck — this is why he made one anyway

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warcraft flight

"Warcraft," the long-awaited adaptation of the popular online video game, is finally in theaters. 

The film, from Legendary and Blizzard, has been in production for over a decade and is the latest video game adaptation to hit theaters.

If you're familiar with video game movies then you'll know the track record for them isn't so great. The majority aren't revered by critics or audiences, and, other than the "Resident Evil" franchise (and arguably the first "Tomb Raider"), are not glorified as huge Hollywood hits. There are over 18 million searches across Google for "why video game movies are bad."

"Warcraft" itself currently sits at 27% on RottenTomatoes. While it may bomb stateside, the movie is already performing exceedingly well overseas. It's already made over $280 million internationally.

Still, at this point, you may wonder why a director would want to take on a video game franchise when the genre isn't so hot at the box office.

This is the question I asked "Warcraft" director Duncan Jones, who, yes, is aware that video game movies can suck. Tech Insider spoke with Jones a few weeks back on the phone after a screening for the film, and it was clear that if anyone was going to make a movie about the video game that he was probably the one to do it.

duncan jones warcraft

Jones is a big sci-fi and fantasy film fan. If you're familiar with his work, you'll know he directed 2009's "Moon," a modern day "2001: A Space Odyssey," starring Sam Rockwell and Kevin Spacey. When it comes to "Warcraft," he started playing the games 20 years ago. When Jones first learned the film was getting made, it was back when "Spider-Man" director Sam Raimi was initially attached until leaving the director's chair in 2012 to work on "Oz the Great and Powerful." 

Jones tells us that Legendary and Blizzard didn't approach him to make "Warcraft." He actually wanted in on the film and sought them out.

"I had just finished my second film, ‘Source Code' [2011], which had been well received," Jones explains. "As a fan, I actually reached out. They weren’t looking for me, but I actually went looking for them to see whether they’d be interested in me at least coming in and giving them a pitch. Fortunately, they did and it all worked out really well."

From early on, the idea for "Warcraft" was to pit the humans against the Orcs; however, Jones says when he came aboard he helped shape the story from what could have been a more generic adaptation of the source material.

"Their approach earlier had been a little bit more traditional in my mind. It had been that the humans were the good guys and the creatures were the bad guys. And my sort of spin on it, which I think was much more in keeping with the game, was that the bad guys, or the creatures rather, had heroes on their side, too," Jones explains to TI. "So good guys and bad guys was more a matter of the characters which made bad choices as opposed to monsters being bad, humans being good."

warcraft

So we know that Jones is a big fan of "Warcraft," but what made him want to tackle a video game movie? Video games aren't known for lending themselves to films that are generally well-received. Naturally, that had to be something weighing on his mind when taking on the project. Jones says he knew what he was getting into when he took on adapting "Warcraft."

"I think one of the things that helped was that I was such a fan of the games in the first place so when I approached it, I was able to approach it almost purely as a filmmaker," Jones says of why he took on the video game adaptation. "[I was] just trying to work out how to make the best movie because I already felt like I was deeply surrounded and understood the material enough that when I made a movie, it would feel right for fans."

He acknowledged that you don't always get people working on video-game-to-film adaptations that really know the source material well.

duncan jones

"I think a lot people, who are kind of brought into these [movie projects] who don’t really know about the game, try too hard to bring in what they think the game is and maybe sometimes miss ... the experience that the players of the games are craving to see in a movie," he says.

While some may argue the movie was only made with fans of the game in mind, I didn't find that to be the case. Mind you, "Warcraft" isn't a movie I would recommend to run out and see; however, as someone who is not caught up in the game's lore and who knows little about the franchise, I was able to comprehend most of the story through the eyes of Garona, a character who finds herself caught in between both the Orcs and the humans in the film. 

garona warcraft

"I think with Warcraft, what we tried to do was just make a great fantasy movie," says Jones. "So the video game aspect of it is, you know, in the same way that Peter Jackson took the Tolkien story and made a great movie out of 'Fellowship of the Rings,' we tried to make a great movie out of the stories told in Warcraft."

"Those people who love 'Warcraft' will hopefully get a chance to see the film, and feel like they’ve gone home," he adds. "We want them to recognize this place that they’ve spent so much time [in]. But we also want people who know nothing about ‘Warcraft’ to hopefully come and see this movie and get just a little bit of a sense that 100 million people have been so excited about for 20 years."

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NOW WATCH: Stunning video of what 'World of Warcraft' might look like if it were made today

Here's the movie that will save the struggling summer box office

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Power rankings_Finding Dory_4x3

Things haven't been so great at the summer box office since our last power ranking.

"X-Men: Apocalypse" nosedived after its opening weekend and "Alice Through the Looking Glass"performed nowhere near the original movie.

It's time for sequels to have a comeback, and Hollywood is happy to see that a Pixar movie is on deck.

With "Finding Dory," the sequel to the monster 2003 hit "Finding Nemo," opening on Friday, we're sure to see big box-office dollars, which we really haven't seen since "Captain America: Civil War" opened in early May.

Here's the latest ranking of the big Hollywood titles of the summer.

Read all of our summer movie power rankings.

SEE ALSO: 41 movies you have to see this summer

10. “Alice Through the Looking Glass” (May 27)

In a year dominated by Disney titles, the house that Mickey built finally released a dud. The "Alice in Wonderland" sequel has not found an audience, having only taken in just $62.5 million in the US. 

Though this movie just isn't as good as the original, it probably also got hurt at the box office by its star Johnny Depp being in the news for allegedly physically abusing his estranged wife, Amber Heard.  

Last Ranking: 7th



9. “X-Men: Apocalypse” (May 27)

With a respectable $79.8 million opening over Memorial Day weekend, things were looking good for the latest X-Men movie, but sadly things went south.

The movie dropped 65% in earnings the second weekend, which inevitably makes a movie with around a $200 million budget a loser.   

Last Ranking: 6th 

 

 



8. “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising” (May 20)

So far comedies aren't doing so well this summer. "Neighbors 2" went into its release with some encouraging reviews touting how it lives up to the original, but it looks like most folks won't see that until it gets to home video. The movie has only earned $53 million domestically so far.

The original "Neighbors" had already earned over $128 million by this time.

Last Ranking: 8th



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'Shrek' is getting revived for more movies after Comcast bought DreamWorks

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Shrek DreamWorks

DreamWorks Animation looks to be heading back into the swamp.

In the wake of Comcast's acquisition of the animation studio, NBCUniversal chief Steve Burke said it has plans for more "Shrek" movies in the future, according to Deadline.

Chris Meledandri, head of Illumination Entertainment — which Universal owns — "is creatively going to try to help us figure out how to resurrect 'Shrek' and take a lot of the existing DreamWorks franchises and add value as we create new franchises," Burke said.

Burke also said there are hopes to produce "as many as four animated movies a year." 

The first two "Shrek" films were well-received, both pulling in an 88% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The most recent two, "Shrek the Third" and "Shrek Forever After," however, didn't get the same reception — with a rotten score of 40% and 58%, respectively.

All four "Shrek" films have earned a total $1.6 billion in domestic grosses, adjusted for inflation.

In addition to "Shrek," DreamWorks Animation is also home to the "Kung Fu Panda,""Madagascar," and "How to Train Your Dragon" franchises. Illumination Entertainment is responsible for the mega-popular Minions and the "Despicable Me" franchise.

Deadline also reports that Burke said the goal is to create characters that will lead to theme-park attractions and licensed merchandise to take “the low-single digit returns of the movie business and turn it into a different kind of business.”

Comcast purchased DreamWorks Animation for $3.8 billion in April. Clearly, Comcast is already thinking through how to get that big investment to pay off.

DreamWorks' "The Croods 2" and "How to Train Your Dragon 3" are set to be released in December 2017 and June 2018, respectively. Its original film version of "Captain Underpants" is scheduled for a June 2017 release.

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Disney just released the trailer for its 'Pete's Dragon' remake

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Disney just released the first full-length trailer for its upcoming remake of the 1977 family classic "Pete's Dragon," which combined live action and animation. The 2016 version, due out this August, appears to implement CGI to create the titular beast that befriends a small-town boy.

"Pete's Dragon" is the newest addition to Disney's steadily-growing slate of remakes, following the success of "The Jungle Book" and "Cinderella." In December, the studio will release a live action reboot of its 1991 animated classic "Beauty and the Beast." 

"Pete's Dragon" is scheduled to fly into theaters on August 12.

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Steven Spielberg reveals the one movie that nearly ended his career

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Steven Spielberg

Director Steven Spielberg says that he contemplated retirement after completing his 1993 Holocaust film "Schindler's List," in a new profile by The Hollywood Reporter.

Though the film won seven Oscars in 1994 — including Best Picture and Best Director — and cemented his legendary status, Spielberg reportedly lost interest in filmmaking because of the emotionally draining nature of the film. He had no desire to get back in the game.

"I just didn't," Spielberg said, explaining his four-year hiatus after the release of the film. "I could not."

In response to a question about whether working on "Schindler's List" sent him into a depression, Spielberg initially said yes and then backtracked. 

"I've never been depressed," he said. "I was sad and isolated, and as well-received and successful as that movie was, I think it was the trauma of telling the story and forming the Shoah Foundation." 

In the years following the film's release, according to THR, Spielberg spent his time "sending videographers to interview Holocaust survivors," but he began to lose interest in feature films.

"I started to wonder, was 'Schindler's List' going to be the last film I would direct?" Spielberg recalled.

In 1997, however, Spielberg said the prospect of directing a sequel to one of his most commercially successful films "seized [him] one day like a thunderbolt," and he returned to the movie industry with the release of "The Lost World: Jurassic Park."

"I just needed time," Spielberg said. 

SEE ALSO: 'The world is full of monsters': Steven Spielberg tells Harvard grads to fight injustice and 'create a world that lasts forever'

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Lin-Manuel Miranda and The Rock team up in the trailer for Disney's 'Moana'

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Disney released a trailer for its upcoming animated movie "Moana," which stars Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as a Hawaiian demigod named Maui. Directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, the same duo responsible for Disney classics "The Little Mermaid" and "Aladdin," the movie promises to continue the success of Disney's animation division after blockbusters like "Frozen" and "Zootopia."

The secret weapon that may push the movie into the box office stratosphere is "Hamilton" creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, who is contributing original music for "Moana." Fresh off of his multiple wins at the Tony Awards, Miranda is undoubtedly one of the hottest commodities in the entertainment world. Disney also tapped him to co-star in the studio's upcoming reboot of "Mary Poppins" with Emily Blount.

"Moana" is scheduled to arrive in theaters this August.

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Pixar's most and least successful movies at the box office, ranked

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pixar logo

With the release of its 17th film, "Finding Dory," on June 17, Pixar will likely continue the box-office domination that began with the release of its first film, "Toy Story," in 1995.

Though each Pixar film released has made the studio a substantial net profit, not every movie has lived up to the immense success of some of the company's true blockbuster hits.

Using Box Office Mojo's and The Numbers' sales and production statistics for each film, Business Insider has ranked all 16 Pixar movies so far by their inflation-adjusted net profit, to keep things on an even playing field (so, subtracting budget from box-office gross) to determine which film was the most financially successful of its time. (The formula doesn't take into account marketing and other costs, however, so net profits are actually likely smaller.)

Accordingly, we adjusted all global box-office receipts and budgets for inflation through 2016 using the US inflation calculator.

Read on to see which Pixar film came out on top, and which landed at the bottom of the heap:

SEE ALSO: Every Pixar movie, ranked — here's how 'Finding Dory' stacks up

16. "The Good Dinosaur" (2015) - Adjusted net profit: $158.3 million

Adjusted gross: 335 million

Unadjusted gross: 331.9 million

Adjusted budget: 176.7 million

Unadjusted budget: 175 million*

*Note: Pixar never officially disclosed budget information for "The Good Dinosaur," but the LA Times reported that the budget was estimated between $175 million and $200 million. Given the lowest possible budget, this film was still the least financially successful.



15. "A Bug's Life" (1998) - Adjusted net profit: $357.3 million

Adjusted gross: 533.4 million

Unadjusted gross: 363.4 million

Adjusted budget: 176.1 million

Unadjusted budget: 120 million



14. "Brave" (2012) - Adjusted net profit: $368.9 million

Adjusted gross: 533.4 million

Unadjusted gross: 363.4 million

Adjusted budget: 176.1 million

Unadjusted budget: 120 million



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The first trailer for the long-awaited Tupac biopic is out, and the resemblance is striking

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Tupac Shakur 2pac Rapper

The first trailer for the long-awaited biopic of Tupac Shakur "All Eyez on Me" came out today, on what would have been Shakur's 45th birthday.

The film stars Demetrius Shipp as Shakur and finds Jamal Woolard reprising the role of rapper Biggie Smalls from the 2009 biopic "Notorious." Benny Boom, a notable name in rap music videos, will direct the film. 

In the trailer, Shipp appears as late-career, bald-headed Tupac, and his voice and looks seem to make for a spot-on portrayal of the rapper. 

The teaser trailer, released through the Instagram of Los Angeles radio station Big Boy's Neigborhood, is our first glimpse at "All Eyez on Me" since footage of Shipp portraying Shakur in a reenactment of the rapper's 1994 courthouse interview leaked back in April. 

The film is set for a November 11 release date.

Watch the trailer below.

Checkout the teaser trailer for All Eyez On Me! June 16th is Tupac's birthday. What's your favorite Tupac song?

A video posted by Big Boy's Neighborhood (@bigboysneighborhood) on Jun 15, 2016 at 10:58pm PDT on

 

 

 

SEE ALSO: Tupac's custom Hummer just sold for $337,000

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The trailer for the highly-anticipated Tupac Shakur biopic just arrived

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The first trailer for the long-awaited Tupac Shakur biopic "All Eyez on Me"just hit the internet. Directed by veteran music video director Benny Boom, the movie is scheduled to be released in November.

Actor Demetrius Shipp plays the late rapper, who died in 1996 after being fatally shot in a case that remains unsolved. 

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The 20 best dad movies for Father's Day

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Field of Dreams

Given that Father's Day is coming up, it's time to hand your dad the remote.

After surveying various people, it seems like almost all dads has one thing in common: they like to watch the same types of movies. You might refer to these as "dad movies."

The best dad movies vary in quality. A lot of them are underdog sports stories. And yes, a lot of them star Tom Hanks, who has rightfully been called "America's Dad" in the past.

To ring in Father's Day, here are the 20 greatest dad movies (presented in alphabetical order).

"Air Force One"

After Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford is America's runner-up dad. Indiana Jones and Han Solo are cool dad icons, even if neither were particularly good fathers. Yet, in his movies, he's always trying to save his family. And what is better than hearing Harrison Ford, playing the president, shouting "get off my plane!" as he attempts to rescue his family?



"Animal House"

This is probably the dirtiest movie your dad will tolerate. Personally, my dad owned "Animal House" on Betamax, and watched it so many times that he can still recite all the lines. Think of it as the "Old School" of your dad's generation.

This movie might have reflected your dad's college years, but you'll also hope it didn't.



"Apollo 13"

Based on our survey, if there's two things dads love in movies, it's outer space and Tom Hanks. "Apollo 13" provides both in one convenient place. 



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Disney has been hiding a secret message in its movies for years

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Woody, Toy Story, number

Pixar has been known for its Easter eggs — hidden messages in films — but one of its best has to do with A113.

The letter and numbers can be found in almost all of Pixar's films, from "Toy Story" to "Cars."

It's also in Disney and Pixar's newest release, "Finding Dory," out this weekend toward the film's end.

What does it mean?

Pixar's John Lasseter has explained A113 is the number of the animation classroom at the California Institute of the Arts.

Many animators like Lasseter attended school there, and by including the number they are giving a subtle shout-out to their alma mater.

Pixar animators

The number has been used for many different things in Pixar films, such as a license plate in 1995's "Toy Story," seen above.

It was on a camera in 2003's "Finding Nemo."

finding nemo, number

A113 is also the number of a train in 2006's "Cars."

train, cars, number

You can find it on a box that Flik walks by in 1998's "A Bug's Life."

a bugs life, number

Here's Sully from 2013's "Monsters University" entering a classroom whose number is A113.

monsters university sulley

However, Pixar films aren't the only ones to hide the number in plain sight. Here's Tiana from Disney's 2009 "The Princess and the Frog" jumping on a trolley car marked A113.

Princess and the frog, number

"The Simpsons" used it for Bart Simpson's mug shot.

the simpsons, number

It even shows up on a door in 1987's "The Brave Little Toaster."Joe Ranft, who went on to work on Pixar movies including "Toy Story,""A Bug's Life," and "Monsters, Inc.," and Dan Haskett, a character designer on "Toy Story," worked on the film.

the brave little toaster

You can also notice the number on a chewed-up vehicle in Warner Bros.' 1999 movie "The Iron Giant." The director, Brad Bird, later made Pixar hit "The Incredibles."the iron giant a113

Even live-action films like 2012's "The Avengers" had a file labeled A113.

the avengers, number

In "Finding Dory," look out for a truck at the Marine Life Institute. It's license plates feature the popular A113. The sequel is in theaters Friday, June 17.

Frank Pallotta contributed to an original version of this story.

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NOW WATCH: 'The Little Prince' trailer looks better than anything Pixar has made in years

The story behind Pixar's great new short movie, according to the director

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Piper Disney Pixar

Less than a mile from Pixar Studios in Emeryville, California, there's a calming stretch of beach that animator Alan Barillaro visits often. Three years ago, while walking along that Pacific shore, Barillaro came on an idea that has become the latest great Pixar work.

It's "Piper," the short film showing before "Finding Dory," which is out Friday.

At the time Barillaro, 41, was heavily involved in what Pixar calls a “Tools” session. It’s when animators basically spend time messing around with the company’s proprietary software to see the ways they can implement new tools for their projects.

Barillaro didn’t get into specifics of the session when he talked to Business Insider recently, but Pixar CCO John Lassetter wasn’t that into it anyway. But the character Barillaro created for the test had promise.

Starting out with the crow from “Brave,” Barillaro transformed that into one of the tiny sandpiper birds he saw constantly on his trips to the beach running back and forth from the tide.

With the encouragement of Lasseter and “Finding Dory” director Andrew Stanton, Barillaro found himself working on storyboards about the sandpiper.

“I got to be totally honest,” Barillaro told Business Insider, “it was outside all of the normal development structure of the studio.”

Barillaro, who has been at Pixar since he was 18, has worked on almost every level at the studio — animator on "Monsters, Inc.," supervising animator on "The Incredibles" and "Brave"— but having never directed before, he was searching for advice.

“I assumed with directing, I would get the secrets of how to do it from Andrew and John, the tools they use to guide themselves,” but then he realized something else about those filmmakers' talent.

“What I found I was lacking was how personal they take their work and being honest in what you’re trying to say,” Barillaro said.

He spent a year with storyboard artists trying to formulate his sandpiper, which he named Piper. What he came up with was a baby sandpiper who is no longer being fed by his mother, so he has to overcome his fear of the water to get his own meals.

Piper Disney Pixar finalLasseter was impressed by the progress and greenlit the project to be Pixar’s latest short for "Dory."

Barillaro said it was working with Stanton as animation supervisor on “WALL-E” that made him understand how to make a compelling and personal six-minute short about a sandpiper and his mother with absolutely zero dialogue.

“People have to remember, when we start these things, we have no idea how we’ll pull it off,” Barillaro said. “I remember reading the script for ‘WALL-E’ and going to Andrew’s office and reading act one and couldn’t believe we were going to tell a love story between two robots with no dialogue. I felt I was taking lessons learned from that film and applying them to mine.”

It took just over a year and a half to do the animation for “Piper,” which included close to 7 million feathers created for the sandpipers and billions of sand pebbles to make up the beach.

“At some point you just realize numbers haven’t been created to count how many we did,” Barillaro said of the sand pebbles.

But seeing as “Piper” was born from a Tools session, Barillaro wanted to push the animation technology at Pixar as far as he could. The short uses the new render software that Stanton also used in “Finding Dory,” and to get the sandpiper feathers and the rushing tide to look right, animators who totaled up to 40 did almost everything by hand, as opposed to having the software create simulations.

Alan Barillaro Deborah Coleman Pixar.JPG“We pushed the rendering power to its limit in this film,” Barillaro said.

But with all Pixar projects, short or long, focus on the story is paramount. And Barillaro’s biggest challenge was finding a way to have Piper and his mother carry a conversation without it looking too human.

Dialogue that was written by Barillaro guided the team initially, but by year three of production, they had to figure out how to make Piper and his mom communicate on their own.

“I was very passionate about not humanizing the story and not going to gestures that are very human, like using hands,” Barillaro said. “One time I asked the animator to do a head shake for the bird, like a human saying ‘no.’ And what I appreciated was a note that John gave me saying, ‘I know it’s hard, but look for another gesture.’ His encouragement to keep looking and not going for the easy one, that meant a lot.”

Barillaro finally handed off “Piper” a few weeks ago — literally hours before the deadline to have the short attached to “Finding Dory” when it plays in theaters. He admits it’s a bittersweet feeling.

“It’s the moment you feel you know how to do it,” he said.

But he also knows that at Pixar, there’s always something else to tackle.

“You come back to the office the next day and after all those years being a bird, now you have to be a monster or a fish,” he said.

Watch a clip from “Piper” below:

SEE ALSO: RANKED: Every Pixar movie from worst to best

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The 'Daredevil' star explains how he totally failed a 'Star Wars' audition

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charlie cox marvels daredevil

It turns out we almost saw Daredevil in "Star Wars." Well, sort of.

Charlie Cox, who plays the title character in Netflix's "Daredevil," is so accustomed to playing the blind Matt Murdock that he forgot how to maintain eye contact while acting for an audition on a "Star Wars" movie. And he says it lost him the role.

“It’s been really fun to look people in the eye,” Cox said in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter. "I had gone to an audition — one of those things that are super-secretive and they don’t tell you, but I’m pretty sure it was for the Han Solo reboot — and halfway through it, the casting director stopped me and said, ‘Why aren’t you looking at me?’"

Apparently all the work on "Daredevil" tripped Cox up.

"I realized I had gotten into a habit of not making eye contact, because the only thing I had done for two years is play someone who is blind," Cox added. "I never got invited back, probably because they couldn’t figure out why I was acting like a complete idiot.”

The actor is apparently just that committed to the role of The Man Without Fear. Meanwhile, the Han Solo role, of course, went to Alden Ehrenreich.

Cox is currently starring in the Off-Broadway play "Incognito" through July 10.

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Reporter walks out of interview after 'Warcraft' director defends movie against criticism

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The latest video-game adaptation, "Warcraft," hasn't been a huge hit among critics. One in particular, BBC News interviewer Adam Rosser, all but declared war on the film's director, Duncan Jones.

After about five minutes of inquiring about Jones' stylistic and narrative choices for the adaptation, Rosser actually gets up and leaves out of frustration.

Here's the awkward moment, GIF'd for posterity:

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For his part, Jones remains upbeat during the interview, simply answering Rosser's questions.

For example, in one of their exchanges, Rosser tells Jones that he doesn't have a sense of what Azeroth, a world in the "World of Warcraft" universe, is. He doesn't understand where the Orc encampment is in relation to the castles of the humans.

"All I feel is that there were moments in a space, and I don't know how they all fit together," he tells Jones.

warcraft review duncan jones

While that could certainly ruffle any director's feathers, Jones handles the question effortlessly.

duncan jones warcraft

From their exchange:

Jones: Well, I'm not sure I could really give you an A to Z. I guess you have to tell me if it feels more like when you first saw "Fellowship of the Ring."

Rosser: Um, problem with that is I come to "Fellowship of the Ring," and Middle-earth, and "The Hobbit" with those maps in front of those books in my mind.

Jones: Well, you're very fortunate. You're coming to "Fellowship of the Ring" as a Tolkien reader. A lot of our audience is coming to "Warcraft" as "Warcraft" players. So I think there is an equivalence in that. But you would probably agree that a lot of people who did see "Lord of the Rings" or "Fellowship of the Ring" had never read Tolkien and enjoyed it just as much. I would argue that a lot of people coming to see "Warcraft" have never played "Warcraft" and will enjoy just it as much.

And that's more or less how much of the nearly six-minute discussion went. Rosser attempted to criticize something in the film — a character or a story decision — and, instead of getting frustrated, Jones calmly and patiently answers with a polite response each time.

warcraft duncan jones

Finally, when asked what he's happiest with in the film, Jones replied, "It's a big, fun, sprawling fantasy film, and I've been reinforced in my belief that that's the case by the incredible feedback I've had from both fans of 'Warcraft' and those who don't know anything about it."

Then, Rosser abruptly gets up and leaves after asking his cameraman a simple, "Yeah?"

Jones looks particularly puzzled.

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Since the exchange occurred, the interview made its way to Reddit with fans supporting Jones' calm manner throughout.

Writes user Kugel:

Havent seen the movie, dont know anything about warcraft. Duncan Jones does a great job trying to uphold a respectful, open dialogue and answer what were clearly attacks with fair reasonable answers that I can totally agree with. The comparison he drew between Azaroth and Middle Earth was quite good and seems entirely reasonable, and it felt like the interviewer was just looking to roast this guy and getting frustrated that his flimsy banter was being countered completely with logic, reasoning and clever insight.

Rosser's Twitter account has since been deleted.

On the upside, "Warcraft" is performing fantastically in China, and Jones has teased a possible sequel or even trilogy, telling Collider that he'd like to explore the "Lich King" storyline.

Here's the full video below. Maybe we can all learn a thing or two about keeping our cool under pressure.

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The tattoos in 'Suicide Squad' are actually really important

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Joker underwent a transformation for "Suicide Squad," and it happened for a reason.

Played by Jared Leto in the upcoming movie, Joker is covered in tattoos, which received mixed reactions from fans.

Director David Ayer told Yahoo Movies UK that the tattoos serve an important purpose.

"The tattoos tell a very specific story," Ayer said. "And eventually people will decipher them and understand what's going on, but obviously they're contentious ... There are very specific stories and Easter eggs in those tattoos. And even his teeth, there's an entire story behind that which is absolutely canon. It's putting his history on his body."

Ayer said he drew inspiration from "drug lords on Instagram" to try and create a more realistic villain.

"If a guy like him really existed today, where would he come from?" Ayer said. "How would he do business? Who would he know? What would he look like? In my mind, I took a lot of inspiration from drug lords on Instagram. It's a great way to understand the lifestyle of a villain."

Harley Quinn is also covered in tattoos, and those serve a purpose as well.

suicide squad trailer one 2According to Margot Robbie, who plays Quinn, she did the tattoos herself in prison.

"They're stick and poke tattoos, prison-style tattoos, that you do when you don't have a tattoo gun," she said. "She did them herself out of boredom and desperation ... There's 'I Heart Puddin,' a Joker face, a love heart ... that's obviously reflective of her time in prison."

"Suicide Squad" will hit theaters August 5.

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The bizarre story behind a 'tickling' documentary that led to online bullying and lawsuits

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Tickled Sundance Film Festival

It all started for David Farrier two years ago, when he stumbled on a company called Jane O’Brien Media, which specializes in making videos that capture “competitive endurance tickling.”

Farrier, a New Zealand television reporter, is known for highlighting the bizarre, so doing a story on so-called competitive tickling — which, in the O’Brien videos, means a man being tied down while other men tickle him — seemed like a slam dunk.

But when Farrier reached out to Jane O’Brien through its Facebook page, he received a reply from a woman named Debbie Kuhn saying the company did not want to “associate with a homosexual journalist.”

Following a few more unpleasant emails and Farrier writing about the bizarre back-and-forth on his blog, editor Dylan Reeve came into the picture. Farrier’s reporting inspired Reeve to delve into the company’s internet activity, and he found that Jane O’Brien is one of hundreds of tickle-related sites that funnel back to one parent company.

Farrier and Reeve decided to combine forces and make a documentary about the “tickle wormhole” they had just discovered.

The movie, “Tickled,” which is out in theaters Friday, was one of the most talked-about documentaries at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. It goes from a bizarre investigation of a “sport” very few know about to thrusting the viewer headfirst into a multimillion-dollar fetish industry and an internet bully who is one of the main players behind it.

But the story has far from ended. Farrier and Reeve have been served with lawsuits from Jane O'Brien Media. They allege private investigators illegally recorded the movie at a film festival. And now one of the subjects in the movie who works for Jane O’Brien has created a blog to discredit the film.

David Farrier Magnolia Pictures“We were expecting it,” Farrier told Business Insider this week in New York City. “We were warned going into this that we would be sued.”

But they admit they weren't prepared for everything else, and it has become an "annoyance."

Initially, Farrier and Reeve only saw the story as an hour-long documentary they would charge people $5 to see on Vimeo. But things quickly escalated. They captured incredible footage of Jane O’Brien staff coming to New Zealand to speak to Farrier, only for both sides to get into a heated argument, and then the two first-time filmmakers flew to Los Angeles to try to walk in on one of the company's "competitive tickling" shoots, only to be asked to leave. That's when the directors realized there was more to the story.

They went back home and showed the footage to the New Zealand Film Commission in hopes of getting financing. (The previous filming was funded through a Kickstarter campaign.) The commission agreed. Farrier and Reeve would not disclose how much financing they received, but they did say that one of the stipulations for the money was to make the documentary feel more cinematic.

So now working on a feature-length doc, with the help of producer Carthew Neal, Farrier and Reeve went back and reshot interviews with ticklers they found in LA and expanded the scope of the story, looking into who exactly is behind Jane O’Brien Media.

“One of the best things Carthew did was he said, ‘How about we look at this as if we were making a drama,’” Reeve told Business Insider. “So we shot with a path [in mind]. It’s not just throwing random footage on a timeline to see what we want. We now knew how to move through the story, and that was important.”

Reeve said one of the ways they found their subjects was by seeking out people who had negative websites set up about them, allegedly made by Jane O’Brien after the subjects asked for videos of them being tickled to be taken down.

But many were reluctant to go on camera, as they didn’t want to feel the wrath once more of Jane O’Brien.

Dylan Reeve Magnolia Pictures

“Getting people on camera was very difficult,” Farrier said. “There were a lot of email conversations. Because we didn’t want everyone speaking out to have their face blacked out. We wanted to see their eyes and how they emoted.”

A Jane O'Brien employee, Kevin Clarke (who's also featured in the movie), has created a site to discredit "Tickled," Tickledmovie.info. On Monday, the site posted a video of one of the subjects in the documentary, Jordan Shillachi, claiming that he was coached by Farrier in what to say in the documentary to disparage Jane O’Brien, he was paid $1,200 to be in the movie, and he was promised a cut of the film's box-office gross.

Farrier told Business Insider that he never coached Shillachi to say anything in the movie and never promised him any of the grosses. But he and Reeve do admit that they paid Shillachi and other subjects to be in the movie.

“As a fixer, we agreed to pay him $400 a day for compensation of his time,” Reeve said. “He got $1,200 for three days and, along with interviewing him, he agreed to show us around the town to hopefully introduce us to some other people, which didn’t pan out.”

“Basically we could only be in Muskegon [the Michigan city where Schillachi lives] for this very set time,” Farrier said. “He was working those days, so the idea was to compensate him for that.”

The filmmakers say the money they gave subjects (about $400 a day — Schillachi got the most out of all who were paid) was simply for the time commitment, and they do not feel that they got untruthful interviews because of the payment.

When asked if they think they should have noted in the film that subjects were compensated, both said that they thought about it and decided against it. Paying interview subjects is "not an unusual practice," they argue.

"A lot of tabloid newspapers pay people for stories, but it's not uncommon for journalists in general to compensate people for their time," Reeve said. "We were quite clear that we weren't paying people to talk to us."

While it is more common in other countries, paying sources is widely frowned upon in American journalism.

All the lawsuits that Jane O'Brien Media filed against Farrier and Reeve have been tossed out in court. But Clarke told Business Insider that he plans on personally suing the filmmakers and the film.

Kevin Clarke Vito M YouTube final“David Farrier was so unethical, it was mind-boggling to me,” said Clarke, who notes that Jane O’Brien Media has not produced any tickling videos in the last six months because the documentary has been “consuming” its time. The latest video on its Facebook page is of tickle participants saying how great the experience is.  

Clarke has seen the movie at the Sundance Film Festival and the True/False Film Festival, where two people were removed from a screening for allegedly illegally recording the movie — Farrier claims they were private investigators hired by Jane O’Brien Media.

Clarke believes he and his associates who went to New Zealand to talk to Farrier and Reeve were misled. He says they believed their first meeting would be off the record. Instead, the filmmakers started recording the O'Brien employees with a camera as soon as they got off the plane in New Zealand.

One of Clarke's associates, he tells Business Insider, was so shaken up that he started to cry. This led to Farrier telling the group, Clarke claims, that if the footage were used, the man's face would be blurred out, which did not happen.

“I have been portrayed as a thug,” Clarke said. “This has impacted lives for profit, and why is that okay? That’s what’s frustrating and that’s the reason for the blog.”

In response to Clarke's accusations, Farrier provided Business Insider with the following statement: “We stand by the film we’ve made and invite people to watch the movie and draw their own conclusions.”

Clarke would not comment on accusations in the movie from ticklers who say they were bullied by Jane O’Brien Media when they asked for videos to be taken down. But he denied the story that's in the movie of one former tickler, TJ, who said that Clarke told him the videos would involve men and women tickling each other (the shoot was all men) and that the videos were being produced as a tool for the military to test the effectiveness of tickling as a means for torture.

“I never said it,” Clarke said. “I would never say anything like that. I'm very clear to anyone who comes to do it exactly what they are doing. I never asked anyone to do anything they didn't want to do.”

But the filmmakers disagree. Though the movie does form into a detective piece on who is really pulling the strings at Jane O’Brien Media, Farrier and Reeve believe the film’s main motivation is something very simple.

“The thing that interests me, and we had this discussion with Kevin in person, is he completely fails to understand the point of the film,” Reeve said. “The point of the film is this bullying and harassment.”

“Each day, and that’s not an exaggeration, we get emails or Facebook posts or Twitter DMs or Instagrams of people saying, ‘This happened to me,’” Ferrier said. “It’s become an obsession for us. It just doesn’t stop.”

SEE ALSO: The story behind Pixar's great new short movie, according to the director

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The cast of 'The Fast and the Furious' 15 years after the original movie

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Vin Diesel Fast and the Furious 2001

"The Fast and the Furious," that movie where the cars go fast and often fall out of buildings, was released 15 years ago.

When it came out in 2001, it grossed a solid $207.3 million worldwide. What nobody could have predicted was that it would launch one of the biggest franchises in the world. All seven "Fast and the Furious" movies have grossed a combined $1.3 billion worldwide. An eighth entry in the series, "Fast 8," will be out on April 14, 2017.

The franchise has grown in many ways, with later entries taking place everywhere from Dubai to Tokyo. Huge stars such as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Ludacris would also sign on for the sequels.

But let's go back to where it all began. In honor of its 15-year anniversary, here's a look at the cast of "The Fast and the Furious" then and now:

Vin Diesel plays professional street racer Dominic Toretto.



Diesel is a huge star in every sense. He's part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and he's remained an integral part of the "Fast and the Furious" franchise. In addition, he has nearly 100 million followers on Facebook.

In 2015, Diesel even claimed that "Furious 7" would win Best Picture at the Oscars. It didn't happen, but he truly meant it.



Michelle Rodriguez plays Dom's girlfriend, Letty.



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Amy Schumer cut a gun-shooting scene from her new movie after the Orlando massacre

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Amy Schumer Chuck Schumer

After the tragic shooting in Orlando, Florida, that left 49 people dead, Amy Schumer will be tweaking her new movie.

Schumer is shooting her still untitled comedy, costarring Goldie Hawn, in Hawaii. According to E!, Schumer has decided to cut "at least one scene" from the movie that "shows someone shooting a gun at people," in direct response to the Orlando shooting.

Schumer has risen to international prominence in the past year. The comedian has used her new platform to become an outspoken gun-control advocate.

In July 2015, two people were killed when a gunman opened fire during a showing of her movie, "Trainwreck." Afterward, she has teamed up with her cousin, US Sen. Chuck Schumer, on several occasions to speak out against gun violence.

In October 2015, she hosted "Saturday Night Live" and starred in a sketch lampooning America's obsession with guns that earned a lot of praise.

Schumer's new movie will be released on May 12, 2017.

Her publicist was not immediately available for comment.

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