Lilo, Stitch And Sigur Ros

I've gone on and on about the movements of Lilo and Stitch director Chris Sanders, but what of Dean DeBlois, his co-pilot?

He's got another film out soon - in November, in fact. And while I hadn't heard of it until this afternoon, I'm suddenly rather excited to see what he's made.

Heima is to be rather unlike his hula-infused animated debut, however. It's a concert film, showing the Icelandic band Sigur Ros, and reportedly constructed from a selection of very intimate shots, many of them sustained close-ups. Looking at the trailer, I can see that it also reveals a very wide open sense of Iceland.

DeBlois comes across brilliantly on the Lilo and Stitch DVD supplementary features, particularly the feature-length documentary The Story Room.

According to imdb, which doesn't list Heima, DeBlois is also at work on another animated feature, The Banshee and Fin Magee. Don't forget his name.

Chris Sanders Out At Disney, New Director - And Plot! - For American Dog

Jim Hill Media have a very intensive break down of the comings-and-goings at Disney over American Dog, their big release for next year. Many of the characters we've seen in test footage have now been axed, the lead character redesigned and the plot radically revamped. Curiously, the story (which you can read at Jim Hill Media) seems like a weird hybrid of Buzz Lightyear's arc in Toy Story and the direct-to-DVD 101 Dalmatians sequel Patch's London Adventure.

According to the report, John Lasseter was not a fan of Lilo and Stitch. I love the film, for the most part - it's the visual style and set-pieces, mainly - but it is obvious that the third act was severely lacking and depended on some dry, overlong dialogue scenes and a touch of deus ex machina to get the loose ends anything like tied up. That film's director Chris Sanders is an obvious talent however, and I think Disney might live to regret losing him.

American Dogs' new director is reported to be Chris Williams, a story artist on Mulan and The Emperor's New Groove. If he's had the nod from Lasseter, I'm sure he's a good guy but, for now, we can only cross our fingers and hope that he has the odd wit and idiosyncratic style of Sanders.