Extraterrestrial life is hot in 2008. After Wall-E, Planet One and Space Chimps, Terra will be the fourth animated movie with space/aliens as storyline. Terra is a CG animation movie based on the short movie by the same name from director  Aristomenis Tsirbas. The independent Snoot Entertainment Studio will take care of the production, however a distributor hasn’t been found yet. There are some famous voices in the movie, like Evan Rachel Wood, Chris Evans, Justin Long, Luke Wilson, Amanda Peet, Dennis Quaid, Danny Glover, James Garner and Rosanna Arquette.

The peaceful planet Terra is threatened by an invasion by the human race. After the destruction of earth, caused by greed and pollution, this would make an ideal ‘fresh’ planet for the homeless humans. The reptile-like inhabitants of Terra are considered as an unnecessary animal race, however in reality they are highly civilised beings. With their paddle-like tails the Terrians swim in helium air like fishes in the water. Their fear of people is great. Mala, a rebellious Terrian teen, is doing everything to stop the destructions. Just as in Planet One it is a story about an inverted alien invasion. Producer Keith Calder says it is not an anti-human movie, because the movie shows both the good and the bad qualities of mankind.

The trailer for Beowulf is released.

Planet One is the most expensive Spanish movie ever made … and it’s a CGI animated feature! Joe Stillman (Shrek 1 & 2) cooperates with Ilion Animation and Handmade Films on this alien project.

The inhabitants of Planet One are green, have 8 fingers and live in a society with great fear for extraterrestrial invaders. Lem, an ordinary greenling, still lives in his parents’ basement in a quiet suburban house. Suddenly, everything changes in his ordinary life when an ‘alien’ astronaut called Russ Baker lands in his backyard. With his strange NASA space ship broken, the American hero needs to find a way home. Luckily he gets a helping hand from Lem to avoid the extremely vigilant government agents.

A promising story and nice graphics: this might be an important step in the European animation industry. I’m curious how this will evolve. The movie will be released in the first quarter of 2008. Click ‘read more’ for some more impressions.

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Robert Zemeckis’ new digital 3D movie called A Christmas Carol, is an adaptation of the classic Christmas story by Charles Dickens. In cooperation with Disney, Zemeckis founded the performance capture company ImageMoversDigital. A Christmas Carol will be the first big project for the company and will use the same technique as The Polar Express.

This performance capture technique means that the actors get to wear a funny suit with sensors so every movement can be followed by computers. This way you will get a very realistic animation.

Jim Carrey has signed for the role of Ebenezer Scrooge and the ghosts of Christmas present, past and future. Bob Hoskins (Who Framed Roger Rabbit) mentioned in an interview that he will play the part of Mr. Fezziwig but this hasn’t been confirmed. Zemeckis had Carrey in mind when he started this project. The other names on his wishlist are Tom Hanks as Bob Cratchit, Christopher Lloyd as Marley’s ghost and Michael J. Fox as Tiny Tim. Whether these actors will take part in the movie depends on financial means.

A Christmas Carol will be released around Christmas 2009. The production team of that other Disney movie The Princess and the frog isn’t so happy with that date. This movie should be released around the same period of time and is expected to be the big Disney comeback with traditional animation. If Disney competes with it’s own Princess and the Frog, the team wonders if the full promotion capacity will be used or if there will be other consequences or plans. (Source Jim Hill)

Barry Sonnenfeld, the successful director of movies like Men in Black and The Addams Family, is going to be a creative consultant on the new animated feature called Space Chimps. Space Chimps is a project of Vanguard Animations (Valiant, Hapilly n’Ever After) about (you’ve guessed it) chimps in space!

Ham III, the somewhat lazy grandson of the first chimp in space, is stimulated to step into his grandfather’s legendary footsteps. Together with two colleague astronaut chimps he takes part in an exiting space mission for NASA. The goal for this mission is a weird, unknown planet in a far away galaxy. On this planet it soon becomes clear that the aliens are being exploited by the dictatorial regime of its leader. It’s now up to our never-do-well chimp to save the aliens from their doom.

The creators think of the movie as an epic and comical space adventure. Andy Samberg, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Daniels, Stanly Tucci and Patrick Warburton are some of the cast members. The movie is directed by Kirk DeMicco. Some additional musical aspects are provided by the popular Blue Man Group. The movie will be released in May 2008 in the US.

Enchanted will be one of those magical Disney movies with a mix of live-action and traditional 2D animation.

Princess Giselle (Amy Adams) lives in her fairytale world Andalasia, where magical creatures hop joyfully and musical encounters are usual business. Giselle is happily engaged to prince Edward (James Marsden), but faith strikes when the evil queen Narissa (Susan Sarandon) banishes Giselle to the real life city of New York. Lost in this big grey world where nobody spontaneously starts to sing, her only hope is divorce lawyer Robert (Patrick Dempsey aka McDreamy from Grey’s Anatomy). Julie Andrews narrates the story.

Long time Disney composer Alain Menken delivers the soundtrack. The movie will be released on November 21st in the United States and on December 14th in the UK. The trailer looks quite funny and I can’t wait to watch this traditional Disney fairytale. Click ‘read more’ to have a look behind the scenes and the movie poster.

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The Tale of Desperaux is an animated 3D movie from Framestore CFC, released by Universal Pictures, based on the book by Kate Dicamillo. The movie will be directed by Sam Fell. The impressive voice cast consists of Matthew Broderick, Dustin Hoffman, William H. Macy, Christopher Lloyd, Robbie Coltrane, Kevin Kline, Stanley Tucci, Tracey Ullman, Sigourney Weaver and Emma Watson.

In the magical kingdom called Dor, the sun always shines, everybody laughs and there’s the best soup ever. But then one day a terrible accident left the royal family broken-hearted and the townsfolk despaired. All hope was lost and the world became dreary gray. Until Despereaux Tilling was born. This romantic and couragous little mouse soon realizes that he is meant for greater things in life. His chivalry ideas are too big for the mouse world and he goes on an adventure with his fellow outcast friend Roscura the rat. Despereaux falls in love with the human princes Pea and with his compagnion he goes on a mission to save her from all her troubles. The movie will be released on December 19th 2008 in the US.

Monstermania! is a computer animated horror-comedy created by Uli Meyer. The project is a cooperation between the London-based Meyer Studio, Ittina Animation Studios from India and Cinecarat from Switzerland. The story is written by top writers Michael Marshall Smith and Stephen Jones.

In this mix of horror and comedy you meet Max van Helsing, a young scientist who, by the will of his deceased grandfather, leaves on an exciting and dangerous adventure. He has to travel to the country of Wallachia in the heart of Eastern Europe. Upon arrival Max comes face to face with classical monsters like Frankenstein, a bunch of werewolves and a lot more bizarre and scary creatures. Of course there is also the girl of his dreams he has to save from the hands of the greatest evil the world has ever known: Vlad or shall we call him Count Dracula.

On the Umbackagain blog from Uli Meyer himself you can follow the development of the movie. There are some good writers behind this animated feature and the mix of horror and comedy looks quite promising. Monstermania! is planned for a worldwide release in 2008. When you click further, there are some great movie posters to admire.

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Great news! The first teaser of Wall-E is out. The clip starts with a flashback to all the different projects of Pixar and in the end you can see a little bit of Wall-E and hear his voice!

Jerry Seinfeld is the brain behind the new Dreamworks Animations production called Bee Movie. The popular stand-up comedian got the idea on a lazy Sunday afternoon when he heard - you guessed it- a buzzing bee. The next day he had lunch with Steven Spielberg and the deal was made.

Seinfeld himself plays the role of Barry B. Benson: a recently graduated bee who comes to the scary realization that he has to spend his whole life inside the bee hive. The boring prospect of making nothing else but honey scares him and it doesn’t take him long to search his freedom. Once outside a beautiful world awaits him and he has an interesting meeting with a New York City florist called Vanessa. She tells him that humans steal all the honey from the bees for the sole purpose of consumption.  Barry is enraged by this idea and sues the entire human race on charges of theft. But maybe that isn’t such a good idea after all…

You’ll also hear these voices buzzing by: Renée Zellweger, Chris Rock, Matthew Broderick, John Goodman, Oprah Winfrey, Eddie Izzard and Larry King. The movie will be released on November 2nd in the US and December 14th 2007 in the UK. Click ‘read more’ for more trailers.

The trailer with the real animation:

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