Cool News
Quint chats with Pixar's Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera about UP! Plus a McCameo!
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. I’m currently getting ready to hit ShoWest. It’s going to be a lite con this year, but I did lock in an interview with the great Michael Caine. In preparation, I’m watching a ton of Michael Caine movies, some I’ve seen, some I haven’t. Just watched THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING for the first time and it was awesome. So, between packing and watching a dozen Caine movies I’m finally catching up on some interviews that have been backing up since WonderCon. I’m kicking this off with a chat with UP director and Pixar veteran Pete Docter (MONSTERS, INC) and producer Jonas Rivera. We conducted this interview in a hallway, of all places, behind the scenes at the Moscone Center. So you’re going to see a cameo show up as the TERMINATOR: SALVATION people leave their roundtables. Also, I have a sketch book that I brought with me to the Con hoping to get someone cool to contribute to. Actually, I was angling to get Dave Gibbons to sketch me a Rorschach if I’m going to be perfectly honest, but I didn’t get the chance. So, I figured a great from Pixar would make it worthwhile for me to have lugged my book all the way to San Francisco. Docter was sketching as we talked. I’ll include a pic of the final sketch at the end of the chat. As we settled in we talked about the footage shown at BNAT and much earlier at the Disney Animation presentation in New York a while back, much of that incomplete, some storyboards and half-rendered scenes. Enjoy!
Quint: I actually really love that process of seeing the animation. You know, growing up you would always see them… I remember seeing something when I was growing up… it wasn’t WONDERFUL WORLD OF DISNEY I don’t think, but where you would see the pencil animations from SNOW WHITE…
Pete Docter: Yeah, where they would show the guy flipping? That was so cool.
Quint: I love that stuff. I collect comic art and animation cells and all of that stuff, so I love seeing the various steps…
Pete Docter: That’s one of the cool things that I really love about animation, that you know it’s all phony. You know it’s just a bunch of drawings or in our case computer images, but when it’s done well, you totally get sucked into it. You fall into it and fall into love with these characters. You cry. You laugh. There’s something really intriguing about that duplicity, or whatever, of knowing that it’s fake and yet getting totally drawn into it.
Quint: It’s pure magic of the movies. It’s a pure illusion. That’s the joy of film. That’s why creature features, where they actually build the creatures and they have to make it work, like John Carpenter’s THE THING and stuff like that…
Jonas Rivera: Yeah, it’s tactile. It’s there.
Pete Docter: I think you can take it a lot further. The fact that people believe in a bunch of felt with ping pong balls and talk to them… That shows you how far people can be kind of fooled into believing in these characters.
Quint: As long as they like them, it doesn’t matter what they look like. People like Kermit and Ms. Piggy and Gonzo.
Pete Docter: Yeah totally. Those guys are great characters and I mean that’s one of the reasons I got into this, just digging on the Muppets. That and Disneyland, which is kind of the same thing. When you go on Pirates of The Caribbean or The Haunted Mansion, you are taken away to this other world and you know you are still in a warehouse somewhere in Anaheim, but somewhere in your head you are like “I am down there getting shot by pirates.” It’s really cool.
Jonas Rivera: Was it Bob [Peterson, co-director of UP] who said that the ingredients of Pixar were like Charles Schultz, the Tiki room and Snow White? And Star Wars? All those things, our favorite things.
Quint: What’s amazing about Pixar and why people love them so much is because there is always that attention to quality first. Lasseter’s famous quote is “Quality is the best business plan.” It’s true and you look at something like WALL-E and that’s something that no other studio would have done and definitely not done in that way, but that’s something that has touched so many people. It was one of my favorite movies last year. If it had been nominated for best picture, that would have been my pick.
Jonas Rivera: That’s nice to hear.
Pete Docter: In terms of the quality, I think it’s almost like we can’t help ourselves, you know? Part of my job as a director is to tell people “Alright, that’s enough. You don’t need to spend all night working on this, because that’s just going to be in the background. Save your energy for this guy who is going to be full screen,” knowing kind of where to spend your attention, because everybody would kill themselves to get everything absolutely perfect.
Jonas Rivera: Our crew would not stop. They are like Terminators. I swear to God they wont stop. We have to tell them “It’s good enough.”
Pete Docter: “Go home!” Then even after you tell them to go home, they sneak in.
Jonas Rivera: I come back in and have to go “Get out of here!”
Pete Docter: But also you are talking about the type of films that we get to make. I can only credit John [Lasseter] and Ed [Catmull]for building a studio that would take risks like that and not think about what are the consumer driven things. We don’t really think like marketing people, we just think like humans, like the audience. “How is the audience going to react?” We think of ourselves as the audience. We are making these for ourselves.
Quint: I think the danger that a lot of people, especially making animated movies, fall into is that they try to think for only certain parts of the audience. They don’t try to make movies that appeal to kids and to adults and to the teenagers, to everybody, which is one thing I’m really looking forward to your movie. I grew up on movies like COCCOON and BATTERIES NOT INCLUDED and it’s like… People think that kids don’t want to see old people, but it all goes to character. It doesn’t matter what they look like, but if people want to see them.
Pete Docter: I think there is something intrinsically appealing about old people.
Quint: Everybody has a grandpa.
Pete Docter: They do have this charm and almost this “old man license” to say things that other people couldn’t get away with and yet you just feel like “Well, I guess he can say that, because he’s earned it!”
Jonas Rivera: It’s like how we would go to eat with Joe Grant and he would call the waitresses “Honey.” I wish I could call a waitress “Honey.”
Pete Docter: You’d get slapped!
Jonas Rivera: And then I’d get thrown out, but yeah the charm and the grace of that era.
Quint: You do find that freeing, then? Being able to work with a character like Carl, it just let’s you go to places that you usually couldn’t.
Pete Docter: Bob [Peterson] was calling it the “Clark Kent Syndrome.” Maybe that’s not his original term, but your main character, because you have to make him likeable and he can only do things that the audience won’t be turned off by, you sometimes end up with and it’s very easy to, very bland characters as your lead and with Carl, he can say stuff like when the kid asks if he can come in the floating house, he says “No” and slams the door in his face, you still like him and the audience seems to really like that. You don’t turn off the character, you are kind of drawn in, because it’s more unique.
Quint: All of the characters that you remember and this is a way bizarre example, but you remember the Snake Plisskins, you remember the anti-hero. People like the gray areas.
Peter Docter: It’s what makes it interesting, for sure.
Jonas Rivera: Or Woody, another main character who is consumed by jealousy.
Quint: He’s flawed, but he’s still likeable, yeah.
Pete Docter: And that was one of the things in doing that film, we started out, because we had all taken the various story classes, “What’s the character’s problem?” and you have to put that out there in the front and something we learned on that film was “Okay. Woody… at the beginning of the film everything is in balance, so it’s only when you bring Buzz in that suddenly this fault that he has of jealously is brought forth” and Carl is kind of the same way.
Quint: Correct me if I am wrong, but this is the first film that you have directed that you didn’t write, is that right?
Peter Docter: No, I wrote on this one.
Quint: Oh, you did?
Peter Docter: It’s kind of inevitable.
Jonas Rivera: The screenplay is really you and Bob Peterson.
Quint: So, what was that collaboration like then?
Peter Docter: Well, we would sit and talk in our offices about “Where is this character going,” just bouncing ideas around and then at some points, at crucial points we would split off and just bang our heads against the computer and then just comeback and compare our notes. It was not unlike other projects like MONSTERS, INC. or even TOY STORY.
Quint: I got to get a little bit of a look inside the process, on BOLT, they invited me in to do a series of articles from about eight months before it came out and my first time was having a three hour day where I just shadowed John through his process and meeting with everybody and giving his notes. It’s kind of mind blowing, because you kind of build people up sometimes, especially as geeks. I’m such a big Pixar fan and everything that he has done and everything that he has influence over and that whole mentality and I love seeing how he is extending that to the Disney family.
Jonas Rivera: Yeah, he’s doing a great job with that and trying to plug that energy into what they do and returning them to becoming a director driven studio and the process drive. It’s cool to see.
Quint: I love the collaboration and I love that everybody had a voice and that there was a conscious strive to always make everything better, even at each single frame. So, what would you guys do without a Pixar? What it Pixar never happened? Where would you be?
Peter Docter: I don’t know, I think about that sometimes. I’d be doing something totally different, like puppetry or making cabinets or something.
Jonas Rivera: I would be driving the trains at Disneyland or something cool like that, but that’s a great question. I would either be working in a toy store or trying to get a job at Disneyland or something, but I don’t know. I’ve been at Pixar for fourteen years. I was literally an intern that knocked on the door and got a job on TOY STORY and so it’s sort of like my family now. I’ve been lucky enough to have been out and to see how other studios work and I don’t know if I would be able to do it, to be totally honest.
Peter Docter: I always thought that I would grow up and work on THE MUPPET SHOW. I was very depressed when they stopped doing THE MUPPET SHOW.
Quint: That was your dream?
Peter Docter: Yeah.
Jonas Rivera: It was a good goal. He did alright, though.
Peter Docter: Yeah, it worked out alright.
[McG walks up]
McG: Hey guys.
Quint: Hey, how’s it going? This is Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera.
McG: Oh hey, I’m McG, it’s nice to meet you. How does it feel? How’s the new trailer?
Quint: It looks great. I love the new trailer.
McG: Have you been able to talk to Bale about anything lately? Maybe I can put that together. He’s a fan of the site, so I’ll let you know. Reach out and let me know, just text me. We’ll be at Warner’s all week.
Quint: I’m back in Austin on Monday, but count me in.
McG: I really had fun at Butt-Numb-A-Thon. We came in at what, 5am? And we just put Jackie Earle Haley in… Do you know HUMAN TARGET? The DC comic book?
Quint: I’ve heard of it, yeah.
McG: We’re doing it at Fox and he’s in it. Hopefully it will work out. It’s just a pilot. We’ll see what happens. Alright, take it easy guys.
[McG leaves.]
Quint: Sorry about that. (I look at the sketch that Docter has half completed and see he drew in a familiar character). That’s great! When MONSTERS, INC came out, my girlfriend at the time was so crazy for Boo. She loved Boo so much.
Pete Docter: Cool! That was a fun character and there again, I love the… the bird in this movie is kind of the Boo of the movie, where you just never know what the bird is going to do next.
Quint: It was such a good surprise at Butt-Numb-A-Thon too, because everybody… The adventure part of it, like you were saying isn’t that out there yet and when the bird and the dogs came onscreen it was a big surprise.
Pete Docter: We are just now finishing the fourth and fifth reel, the end of the movie, and some of the action stuff in that is turning out really well. It seems like that is taking out the biggest jump from storyboards to final… at least for me…
Jonas Rivera: Yeah, it does. You can’t really see it coming and of course you do, because you are making it, but when you see it lit and rendered, it always kind of surprises us, because it’s just so good. I can’t wait until people see the end of this thing. I think it really is going to shock people with where it goes and just how fast it goes.
Quint: The very first footage from UP that I saw was in New York, when they did their big animation look ahead and even then when it was just the very rough storyboards of Carl’s backstory, it was heartbreaking. I love that that’s still in there, that you have the heartbreak there and then you have a chance to make us laugh with the bird and the malfunctioning dog collars.
Jonas Rivera: Hopefully we strike a balance between with it.
Quint: What’s happening with MONSTERS, INC 2? Is that still in the works?
Pete Docter: Well, so far it’s like with everything where it’s all about the story, so if they come up with something great then we will do it.
Quint: I’d love to see it. I’m a big fan of MONSTERS, INC and I think UP is looking great!
Jonas Rivera: Thanks so much, it was great talking to you.
Short, but sweet… and with a McCameo to boot! So far nothing has materialized with Bale, but believe me… you guys will be the first to know if that gets arranged.
Now here’s the finished sketch Pete Docter drew for the book! Enjoy!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
-Quint quint@aintitcool.com
Readers Talkback
comments powered by Disqus-
+ Expand All
-
.......first.......
-
Not made a bad movie yet...and that's a cool sketch to have, Quint!
-
prior to its opening and we know how that turned out. It's Pixar. Have faith.
-
Deliciously ironic.
-
What a tool.
-
Sher right!<p><p>If Bale reads any of these geek sites then i'll eat my ass hat. Seriously I would, might take a little surgery, but i'd do it.
-
he asks quint if he has ever heard of human target? holy fuck<p> bale is a fan of the site? hahahahahahhaha....bullshit...terminator must suck ass<p> as for the guys at pixar...i just wanna know why they seem to be the only studio that truly has its finger on the pulse of the american public<P> would also like to know if they are thinking about doing a 2d animated flick anytime in the future
-
the movie looks amazing...you should watch the featurette...the guys at pixar actually went into the jungle in venezuela to do research...they aint fucking around<P> and the idea of using an elderly character as your lead is brilliant
-
cuz he is the greatest director who has ever lived...and has made truly meaningful films
-
cuz he is the greatest director who has ever lived...and has made truly meaningful films
-
I shat a brick
-
interesting and lively than CG renderings. He should divorce himself from the computer.
-
...that came up with this one?
-
I still call that my fave of Pixar's.
-
It's all starting to make sense now
-
This movie looks great, I just hope there's a scene where Carl says "Get off my lawn!" (preferably while holding a shotgun).
-
"Hey guys, does Pixar have any lighting techs that need work?"
-
"Seriously Quint, you and I are done professionally..."
-
"Hey guys, even though it's obvious you're in the middle of an interviews, I just wanted to interrupt and be an ass. Cheers!"
-
LOL. I'm sorry, I cracked up at that.
-
March 28, 2009, 10:39 a.m. CST
Up looks great- but get making Incredibles 2 already...
by pipergates
still the greatest superheroe movie ever made
-
I'm sorry, he just doesn't give a fuck about any of this shit. I consider myself to be in The Cult of Bale, but honestly, I'm not deluded enough to think that he's ever even heard of this site. The man takes himself intensely seriously, he doesn't spend time on the webs looking at AICN. Ever.
-
The day I believe that Bale reads this website is the same day I believe that Harry isn't a studio shill
-
was when McG walks up, blows off the Pixar guys completely (because who the hell is Pete Docter, right?), plugs some projects, strings Quint along with the promise of a Bale interview, and leaves. McG: a class act all the way. And he wonders why the geeks give him shit.
-
Seriously. I mean, it sounds like he just jumped in there in the middle of Quint's interview and tried to sell Terminator a little bit more, constantly looking for that validation. It's slightly bizarre. I'm not a complete McG hater, and I'm totally willing to give him a chance with this new Terminator movie but it seems like he's trying FAR too hard. To interrupt another interview like that? I just didn't think that someone at the level of McG would do that.
-
guys u r killing me ;) MCG: "oh i am sorry guys,though this was the toilet."
-
...on his part. I may be wrong, but it sounds like he just barged in, sold Terminator a bit, and left. Come on, dude. And I was slowly looking forward to Terminator, too (still am, actually).
-
Hands down. Pixar's best movie.
-
I would have gone Christian Bale on him. What a douchebag!
-
March 28, 2009, 12:10 p.m. CST
McG! Do you have something to say about this trailer?
by TheMarineBiologist
Firefox had this subject line saved, so I figured I'd just reuse it.<p> Seriously, McG, you deserve a medal or something for the douchebaggery that you are pulling off as of late.<p> 1. You introduce yourself as McG. That is not your name. It does not make you cool. Mr. McGinty works.<p> 2. You interrupted Pixar. That's kinda like walking into a room in which Jesus is giving a speech and talking to his audience as if he isn't there.<p> 3. Lying about Bale. Sure, it would be awesome if Bale was an avid reader of AICN. But I doubt it... Sylvester Stallone, he is not.<p> 4. Interrupting Pixar. I know I said it before, but I need to say it again. YOU DON'T DO IT. Unless you have the experience and the chops to back it up, you do not disrespect a film powerhouse. You directed Charlie's Angels 2, for FUCK's sake.
-
...we'd talk about sports, music,Bea Arthur, and lots of cool stuff. You really don't know what you're missing when you avoid The Zone! zone.aintitcool.com/index.php
-
...Pixar? Never heard of 'em."
-
Ehehehe !
-
you're right, considering it doesn't work and most of you hate him anyway
-
you got fuckin somethin to say to this prick?
-
Translation for first quote: "Oh, hey, I'm a douche." (Can you imagine continually introducing yourself as Mcsomething? Tool.) And does this mean that Bale read our historic BALEBACK?
-
The writer for Time magazine had his eyeballs fucked
-
I want to reread it for old time's sake.
-
I was hoping for a McGuyver or a McDonalds cameo.
-
because moore did not write a sequel to watchmen<p> dont care what bird says...incredibles is the pg-13 version of watchmen...even has the fucking squid in robot form
-
There are no cats in America.
-
I agree with you one hundred percent.
-
My god! The Watchmen did not inspire every freaking bit of creativity that came after it! I am so sick of seeing you spew that crap everytime something new comes out!
-
He comes for the Professionals, stays for the lame-ass "news" and poor writing. ALL HAIL BALE!
-
covered some similar territory that Watchmen did, but it's not trying to tell the same story, or have the same purpose that Watchmen had. Incredibles was about a family finding itself in a world that prizes mediocrity. Watchmen was about taking the superhero ethos and deconstructing it by posing complex moral and ethical problems, and the consequences of their actions. In the former, superheroes are not the object of the story, but a characteristic of it. Watchmen's subject was the superhero as an idea. These are significant differences.
-
Perfectly okay to get inspired by the concept, but I'm sure if some comic scholar really analyzes it, Moore's story was but one of many sources of inspiration.
-
March 28, 2009, 6:43 p.m. CST
There's so much ripped off WATCHMEN stuff in INCREDIBLES
by BALZACS_BALLSAC
Cop strike, Capes causing death of a "super," "monologuing," government involvement with "supers," mysterious island building a giant foe to be unleashed on a city, etc. I could probably list at least five more things if I really thought about it. I liked INCREDIBLES better than WATCHMEN. WATCHMEN had the problem of all of it's major tenets having already been co-opted and built upon already making it passe', kinda like I,AM ROBOT coming out after MATRIX. Asimov, of course came first but Matrix had already taken his ideas and built on them further.
-
March 28, 2009, 7:04 p.m. CST
would like a Incredibles 2 with more mystery and less soap
by pipergates
with the kids a bit older, the tone of the story a bit more serious, and Jack-Jack in control of his powers...good thing Bird is not rushing into a sequel, but i sure hope he's taking notes, collecting ideas. Maybe he could check out some Grant Morrison to get inspired by, eh Ballsac? Or Moore's Top Ten?
-
Every one of those things you mention (and there wasn't a cop strike in the Incredibles, and where did the cape thing become an issue in Watchmen?) is incidental to the ideas each story presents and is concerned with. Ripping off (implying intellectual theft) stories implies that one hasn't added anything new or original to ideas already presented. But as it's already been established, the two stories are concerned with completely different ideas concerning their subject matter.
-
Seriously I wish I was the Pixar guys as soon as he said his name was McG I would have fucked with him till he disappeared "really your name is McG, Your mama didn't name you that!?"
-
is indeed quality.
-
Tell me you just shortened that for expediencies sake. Only a complete TOOL would call themselves by a one word Celeb moniker. And if he knew anything about the business he is in...he'd have kissed the ground those Pixar guys stood on.
-
I want McNuggets. Damn you McG!! DAMN YOU STRAIGHT TO HELL!!
-
McG actually is a nickname that was given to him to differentiate him and his father. It's not a "celeb" nickname, but his own legitimate nickname from childhood.<p> Granted, referring to yourself as McG is kinda douchebaggy, regardless of the origin of the nickname.
-
Go get that royalty check since you and your buddies named it. Don't forget!
-
March 29, 2009, 5:46 a.m. CST
Does anyone know what made Christian Bale decide to do Terminato
by Mr. Pricklepants
Other than the obvious paycheck.<br> <br> Because I highly doubt working with McDouchebag was one of his reasons.
-
Oh, and it goes without saying that Up will be much better than Terminator Salvation.
-
definatly the best bit of the Bale rant for me. Its the way he says it, like the guys a complete retard.....Its fucking distracting!! lol.
-
I don't know the guy, but in his defense of you people who have more balls online that in real life - is it possible that Quint paraphrased his intro? Maybe he used his first name, and Quint thought that the average Joe wouldn't recognise that reference? Even if he did introduce himself as McG, so what. The guy has that right, even if he is a pretentious prick, it's his choice to use a nickname. And as for interupting an interview - it was in a hallway - it probably looked like some guys chatting. Be thankful for Terminator Salvation - it gives you a chance to get out of your Moms basement.
-
You make three bitches bounce from motorcycle to motorcycle in midair without making people laugh. The guy is the next in line for Naked Gun 5.6 and 7/8s! A comedic genius! Terminator will be hilarious!
-
Ever. The Terminator story ended at the end of Terminator 2. Everything since is a cynical money grab.
-
The only thing they have in common is: a) The idea of public outcry against super heroes causing the government to ban them b) the cape "joke" c) a manufactured crisis that ends up bumping off some super heroes in order to make it work. Basically, it's like saying Star Wars ripped off The Hidden Fortress...ya, there are a couple themes they have in common, but to say it's a carbon copy is fucking idiotic at best. Guess what? Almost everything in the whole of human creation has ripped off an idea or a theme from something else. Watchmen ripped off Ook the Caveman, who came up with the idea of Dr. Manhattan back in 50,000 BC. Ook had an idea of a blue human that had godlike powers that could kill a mammoth by just pointing at it. Moore is a fucking hack, ripping off poor Ook.
-
Jersey, Dollarbill died by his caped getting caught in a revolving door while he was foiling a bank robbery. And you and Alientoast, try to debunk my supposition and then turn around and give even more evidence to support ME. The "manufactured crises that ends up bumping off some super heroies in order to make it work" was an angle I hadn't even added. Thanks, Alien and no, YOU stfu.
-
Sideshow says they sent someone the statue. Who won?
-
Damn you to hell!
Top Talkbacks
- Spoilery early review of MAN OF STEEL!! -- 370 total posts 338 posts
- Holy Crossover!! Magneto’s Boy Quicksilver To Speed About In Whedon’s AVENGERS 2 And Singer’s X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST?? -- 318 total posts 106 posts
- A review of Refn and Gosling's ONLY GOD FORGIVES, direct from Cannes!! -- 109 total posts 90 posts
- Tom Cruise Won’t Go Solo For MAN FROM UNCLE!! -- 77 total posts 77 posts
- Green-Band and Red-Band trailers for the new Jason Sudeikis & Jennifer Aniston VACATION ripoff, WE'RE THE MILLERS are here!! -- 146 total posts 54 posts
- The Friday Docback Revisits DOCTOR WHO Season 7!! A Fuller Review Of 'The Name of the Doctor,' And More!! -- 53 total posts 53 posts
- Harry dives into STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS' spoilers to reveal the truth behind the blockbuster we're seeing! -- 1460 total posts 53 posts
- Jon Stewart casts Gael Garcia Bernal for his directorial debut, ROSEWATER!! -- 44 total posts 42 posts
- John Ary's Video Review Of THE HANGOVER PART III!! -- 37 total posts 37 posts
- Ron Howard's latest trailer sure is a RUSH!!! -- 65 total posts 36 posts