Stanton concludes, “Telling a story where the protagonist is the father got me excited. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an animated film from that perspective. It made me interested in wanting to write it because I knew I could tell that story. I also thought that the ocean was a great metaphor for life. It’s the scariest, most intriguing place in the world because anything can be out there. And that can be a bad thing or a good thing. I loved playing with that issue and having a father whose own fears of life impede his parenting abilities. He has to overcome that issue just to become a better father. And having him in the middle of the ocean where he has to confront everything he never wanted to face in life seemed like a great opportunity for fun and still allowed us to delve into some slightly deeper issues.”
He adds, “My dad gave me some good advice about parenting. He said, ‘The tough choice you have is you can either be their parent or their friend. Pick one.’ It’s a lifelong dilemma and I love indulging in that truth with this film. I’m considered the most cynical of the group here at Pixar. I’m the first one to say when something is getting too corny or too sappy. Yet, I’d say I’m probably the biggest sucker romantic in the group, if the emotion is truthful. I just loved the idea of doing a father-son love story. They’re in eternal conflict.”
Pixar’s expert team of animators have had their share of challenges in the past bringing life to toys, bugs and monsters, but their assignment on “Finding Nemo” proved to be the toughest yet. Visits to aquariums, diving stints in Monterey and Hawaii, study sessions in front of Pixar’s well-stocked 25-gallon fish tank, and a series of in-house lectures from an ichthyologist all helped to get them into the swim of things.
The animators also looked at some of the Disney classics that involved underwater scenes – “Pinocchio,” “The Sword in the Stone,” “Bedknobs and Broomsticks,” and “The Little Mermaid” – for inspiration. In the end, it was the naturalistic portrayal of animal life in “Bambi” that left the biggest impression.
Stanton explains, “We kept coming back to ‘Bambi’ because of the way the filmmakers adhered to the real nature of how these animals moved and what their motor skills were. They used that as the basis for getting as much expression, activity and appeal. We wanted our characters to work in that same way. We thought of it as ‘Bambi’ underwater.”
Supervising animator Dylan Brown, an eight year Pixar veteran, and directing animators Mark Walsh and Alan Barillaro were responsible for guiding an animation team that fluctuated between 28 and 50. With a large cast of characters – ranging in size from the petite cleaner shrimp, Jacques, to the enormous blue whale – this group had their work cut out for them as they learned about fish locomotion and discovered how to create believable behaviors for characters without arms and legs.
Brown explains, “Each film has its own unique set of challenges and we always begin by trying to figure out what they are and how to solve them. With ‘Nemo,’ we had an entire cast of fish characters with no arms or legs. Since they didn’t have the traditional limbs to allow strong silhouettes, we had to invent a whole new bag of tricks. In the beginning it was a bit daunting and frustrating. We began analyzing what was appealing in terms of posing fish. We put a lot of work into the face and getting the facial articulation just right. We didn’t want them to be just heads on sticks like in a Monty Python sketch. Their faces had to be integrated with the entire body language. Where a human character might just turn his head to look at something, a fish might turn his head just a little and the entire body would pivot along with it.
Movie Database
In Theaters
