PREVUE MAGAZINE
‘Ferdinand’ is no ordinary bull By James Colt Harrison 20th Century Fox Animation is producing a brand new animated version of the famous bull named Ferdinand. The story is based on author Munro Leaf’s classic children’s novel “The Story of Ferdinand.”Written in 1936 at age 31, Leaf’s book became an instant best-seller. Three years after its publication by Viking Press, it was outselling the monster hit “Gone With The Wind” with 3,000 copies per week. Born in 1905, Munro Leaf was a young man during the Depression in the early 1930s. When he and his best friend, illustrator Robert Lawson, found themselves broke, Leaf dashed off the story of Ferdinand in about an hour for his friend to provide the now-classic pictures. The story was simple and easy for children to understand. Ferdinand was a gentle bull who didn’t like to fight in the bull ring and merely loved to smell the flowers in Spain. When the book became a hit for the two creative artists, they were overwhelmed by the notoriety the book achieved. When Generalissimo Franco took over Spain, he banned the book as pacifist dogma and Hitler had the bookbanned in Nazi Germany and had all the copies burned as propaganda. It was a strange reaction against a mild children’s book.All this fuss over the gentle bull attracted the attention of Walt Disney Productions. Disney considered the short film to be part of the Silly Symphonies series. The 8-minute film was released in November 1938 by RKO Pictures and won the Oscar® that year as Best Short Subject.Fast forward to today and the book has remained a favorite of children in more than 60 countries. The creative staff at Blue Sky Studios and 20th Century Fox Animation were thrilled to get the green-light to produce a new, 3D computer-animated feature film of the classic story. Brought on board to direct the film is Carlos Saldanha. Composer John Powell, who has worked with director Saldanha on previous films, has been signed to write the music.Casting the film was important to capture the correct flavor of the Spanish animal characters. Actor John Cena is starring as Ferdinand the bull, and joining him in the bull ring as other bulls are Gabriel Iglesias, Anthony Anderson and David Tennant. “Saturday Night Live”TV comedy favorite Kate McKinnon plays Lupe the goat! Also in the talented cast are Bobby Cannavale as the bull Valiente, Gina Rodriguez as Una the hedgehog, and Raul Esparza as Moreno.Fox Animation is taking full advantage of the magnificent images that are being produced by the 3D cameras, and the computer artists are working full-steam ahead to ready the film for it’s release date of December 15, 2017.
