Studio:
Warner Brothers (Animation).
Production Company:
Unknown.
Project Phase: Greenlighted.
Whose Voices In It:
Eli Marienthal (Hogarth Hughes); Jennifer Aniston (Annie Hughes); Harry Connick Jr (Dean McCoppen);
Christopher McDonald (Kent Mansley); John Mahoney (Mansley's Boss); M. Emmet Walsh (Earl);
Cloris Leachman (The Teacher); James Gammon (Army General).
Who's Making It:
Brad Bird (Director); Tim McCanlies, Andy Brent Forrester, Brad Bird (Screenwriters); Allison Abate,
Des McAnuff (Producers); Pete Townshend (Musical Score); Based on Ted Hughes' novel and play, The Iron Man:
A Story in Five Nights.
Premise: A giant metal machine falls to Earth and frightens the residents of a small town in Maine in 1958, until it befriends a nine-year-old boy named Hogarth and ultimately finds its humanity by unselfishly saving people from their own fears and prejudices.
Release Date: Summer 1999/Thanksgiving 1999.
Comments: WB Animation's follow-up to The Quest For Camelot was brought forward as a project by Townshend (yes, the guy from The Who), who had a concept album out in 1989 based on the same Hughes children's book, featuring the vocal talents of John Lee Hooker, Nina Simone and Roger Daltrey.
Rumors: Unknown.
Scoop Feedback:
[Page draft submitted by advanced robotics automaton 'Deadpool' and the 'Widgett 9000' computer -- building a better future for you today!]
October 8, 1998... Production on this animated project began a year ago on September 2nd, 1997 in Los Angeles. Not too much info's trickled into CA over the past year regarding this WB project, but we've heard that Iron Giant's story will be reportedly told through a series of flashbacks provided from M. Emmet Walsh's character as he recollects his memories. The title character in question, the 'iron giant', will be a computer generated image (CGI). [Info originally appeared on Cinescape Online and Ain't It Cool, reported by 'Widgett'.]
December 14, 1998... We've been told that Pete Townshend is no longer producing the film. "He merely brought the project to Warner Feature animation. The release date is still up in the air, but the filmmakers are hoping for a summer release so as not to compete with Disney's plans to release all their films as a rollout to Fantasia 2000," our scooper tells us. Prinicipal animation has been completed and the film is currently being 'cleaned up' (the process where animators go over rough pencil drawings and make them one clean line).
"The film is amazing and completely unlike any other animated film, a very serious story and no friggin' songs. Expect this and Prince of Egypt to really reinvent animation. Also, when Brad Bird directed Family Dog, he had Danny Elfman do the score. If Warner's wants to fork over the cash to Danny, he wants to do it. Lets hope Warner's doesn't cheap out." [Anonymous.]