CHAPTER 16
The Animated Feature
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Concerns in Greenlighting an Animated Feature
A major animation feature is very expensive to make, and studios are reluctant to take too
many risks when they’ve got millions of dollars at stake. Many studios purchase the rights
to a book or well-known character for their feature rather than buy an original spec ani-
mation script. Or they retell a classic myth, fairy tale, or story that’s in the public domain.
Some films, like The Wild Thornberrysand The Powerpuff Girls, were popular TV series
before they expanded to the big screen. These stories with marquee value practically guar-
antee a built-in audience. Often studios commission a script for their feature based on a
subject that they think will sell a lot of tickets at the box office. Features normally require
a broad audience to justify costs.
Many features do badly at the box office due to poor quality in the script or in the pro-
duction itself. This can be caused by a budget that’s too low or a lack of experience by the
studio. It might be brought about by a story that’s watered down, or it could be caused by
formula stories that rely too heavily on what has worked in the recent past. Audiences from
a media generation who have seen so many stories long for something different. A good
story is essential. When animated features do poorly at the box office, this frightens the
people who will back films financially, and it becomes even harder to sell a feature story.
After Toy Storyand Shrek, audiences seemed to prefer CGI films, and both Disney and
DreamWorks began to shut down their traditional animation departments. Audience pref-
erences are constantly cycling and in a state of change. In this case I think the quality of the
traditionally animated stories and the power of the press had more to do with box office results
than how the films were made. I look for great traditional animated films again in the future.
The Feature Script and Pre-production
The feature animation script is normally written in a format like a live-action script using
master scenes that do not detail the camera shots, but it has fewer pages. Feature scripts