I can’t believe it! BRAVE will be in theaters everywhere this FRIDAY!! I’ve waited months for this movie (I missed the screening :/) and now I can finally see it with my girls. For me, this movie represents girl power and independence, for both little girls and women. We can conquer anything we set our minds to and be damn good at it too!
While in San Francisco, the bloggers were treated to several interviews with the amazing people behind the movie BRAVE. Here’s the inside scoop from Director, Mark Andrews.
Where did the actual storyline come from?
Brenda Chapman came up with the storyline, the characters and she wanted to set it in Scotland. It came out of her being a parent and her trials and tribulations with her daughter. So she approached John and said, “Hey, I want to do this movie about a mother-daughter relationship and I want to set it in Scotland.” And he said, “Great, go.” And then she started developing that more.
One thing that was noticed — the little boy and little girl – was that totally intentional?
Absolutely! I mean as a storyteller, I’ve been telling stories for 20 years. with live action and animation. I’ve been with Pixar for 10 years. I’ve worked on THE INCREDIBLES and RATATOUILLE. Getting my own films up off the ground. So for me as a storyteller, it’s always about the universal relate-ability of the story. You know, I don’t want to alienate anybody. I don’t want anybody to go, “Oh, that’s not a movie for me.”
I want people to come and see the movie. And go, “Oh yeah, it’s a fish. I’m not a fish. But I know exactly what that fish was going through.” Or, I’m a robot and I felt like that in my relationships. You know, with my significant other. You know, uh, so it’s gotta have something for everybody. And I get asked, are you afraid that your being a girl’s gonna get rid of the boys? I say, “No, I’m, I’m a father of four.” I’ve got a girl and three boys, just like King Fergus.
Was it always gonna be a mother and daughter relationship?
Yes, absolutely. We’ve never done a mother-daughter story and we haven’t set anything in Scotland yet also.
It’s not like there’s a big board of stuff and they’re doing tactical stuff with pie charts, asking people what they want to see. It comes from the directors here.
It comes from their passions and their experiences. And NEMO came out of Andrew being a father for the first time and his worries about raising his son. Pete has an affinity to old folks and we call him “the ageless one,” here at Pixar. Because he just kinda has that affinity of growing old, ’cause at the end you can still have this vibrant life. I went to school with him at Cal Arts and his — all of his films at Cal Arts, his student films were all about old people.
When did you start this project?
Brenda was originally directing, and she had been on it for about four-five years. It was about 18 months ago when Pixar came to me. BRAVE was running into story problems and issues. And usually about the 18 month timeframe, if it’s not working or looking like it’s going to work, Pixar has to do something. They have to make a change, do something and get it going again. And we did this on RATATOUILLE and in TOY STORY 2.
That was even less time, I think they had less than a year — they had nine months to turn that whole thing around, which burned a lot of people. They don’t like to do that but I think that’s one thing that I really admire about Pixar, is that it’s for the story.
You know, it’s to get the story to work. We will push back a release date if it isn’t perfect. We will hold the film back a whole ‘nother year, because it’s still not ready. we make a director change. And it’s happened before and it happens all the time, out in the animation industry, and in live action — all the time.
We heard there was a smaller group of designers on this project, so it took longer than expected. Was there a reason for that?
I think in the beginning they just had the time, because it was so far out. They thought they could just start with the smaller crew and just take their time to develop the film. For Brenda, this was her kind of feature directing herself, she had been directors on other films and was also a co-director. So she could just have time to get in to explore it. And that’s another thing about Pixar, they afford that time if there is time.
Are there any inside jokes in the movie BRAVE?
Everything’s that Pixar is in there, and I’ll give you a little secret — It’s all in one scene.
There you have it! Straight out of the director’s mouth! =)
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Don’t forget, BRAVE is in theaters this FRIDAY!!!
Disclosure: Disney provided me with an all-expense paid trip to San Fransisco for three days for the preview of CHIMPANZEE, LA LUNA and BRAVE. All opinions are all my own, as always.
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