Making Of
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The film was going to be titled “Oobermind”, which was a misspelling of the term “uber-mind.” The word “uber” refers to something that is large or great; in this case, the title character’s over-swollen skullbrain. But it didn’t sound right, so it was revised to become “Megamind”. 2
Megamind (Will Ferrell) is a superintelligent alien who -- at the age of eight days old -- is sent to Earth from his home planet during a time of crisis. However, he lands in The Prison for the Criminally Gifted, thanks to another infant alien similarly sent from a different planet who eventually becomes a superhero known as Metro Man (Brad Pitt), defender of the fictional Metro City. As a result, Megamind is raised as a social deviant, who is neglected for his destructive intellect, with his fish-like sidekick Minion (David Cross) as his only friend. Realizing that he enjoys causing trouble, and jealous of all of the attention Metro Man receives, Megamind becomes a supervillain to rival Metro Man, though he
is thwarted on a regular basis. During one of his many attempts to defeat Metro Man, Megamind kidnaps news reporter Roxanne Ritchi (Tina Fey) and uses her as bait to lure Metro Man into the city observatory where Megamind intends to kill him with a death ray. The plan appears flawed enough for Metro Man to escape, but he proclaims that the inside of the observatory is lined with copper, which he says drains his power. Metro Man is then seemingly killed by the death ray. Megamind is initially happy that he has defeated his archenemy, but soon grows depressed over the fact that without someone to fight, his life as a supervillain no longer has any purpose. 3
Megamind talks with Roxanne while disguised as a museum curator named Bernard and is inspired to create a new superhero to fight using a serum of Metro Man’s DNA. Hoping to uncover any evil plans Megamind has for the city, Roxanne breaks into Megamind’s lair and fights with him over a syringe gun containing the serum, which is accidentally fired and injected into Roxanne’s cameraman Hal Stewart (Jonah Hill). Megamind manipulates Hal into becoming a superhero named Tighten, but at the same time falls in love with Roxanne and begins dating her while disguised as Bernard. Tighten attempts to use his powers to woo Roxanne, but is quickly spurned and grows jealous of the Bernard-disguised Megamind. Megamind soon begins having second thoughts about being a villain, finding more enjoyment pursuing a relationship with Roxanne. He then gets in a fight with Minion and the two friends have a falling out. 4
After Roxanne rejects him when his identity is accidentally exposed, Megamind follows through with his plan to fight Tighten. By this time, however, Tighten has decided he would rather be a supervillain since in his view, being a superhero is too much hard work. Unlike Metro Man, Tighten has no qualms with outright killing Megamind and he is forced to flee for his life. With nobody to stop him, Tighten begins wreaking havoc in Metro City. Noticing how one of his copper-based attacks during the fight had no effect on Tighten, Megamind convinces Roxanne to search for clues on his weakness in Metro Man’s old hideout. 5
Both Megamind and Metro Man’s costumes pay homage to the DC Comics hero Captain Marvel: Metro Man sports an all-white version and Megamind a black version of Marvel’s suit, but Megamind’s suit sports a lightning bolt blazed on it, like Marvel. According to director Tom McGrath, the film draws inspiration from Batman and Superman. 6
There they find Metro Man alive and learn that he faked his death (and his weakness to copper) so that he could retire from being a superhero. Megamind and Roxanne try to persuade Metro Man to defeat Tighten, but he refuses and instead Megamind turns himself in. When Tighten kidnaps Roxanne, however, Megamind is broken out of prison by Minion and goes to save her. Megamind defeats Tighten by draining Metro Man’s DNA from his body, stripping him of his powers, and Hal ends up in Megamind’s former prison cell while Megamind is embraced by Roxanne and Metro City as its new defender. Megamind begins to enjoy his new reputation as a superhero while a disguised Metro Man silently congratulates him. 7
REVIEW
Megamind received generally positive reviews from critics, with the film garnering a 66% “fresh” rating on review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes based on 100 reviews with an average rating of 6.6/10. Its consensus states the film “regurgitates plot points from earlier animated efforts, and isn’t quite as funny as it should be, but a top-shelf voice cast and strong visuals help make Megamind a pleasant, if unspectacular, diversion.” Another review aggregate, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 top reviews from mainstream critics, calculated an average score of 64 based on 32 reviews.
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times awarded the film three out a possible four stars, stating “This set-up is bright and amusing, even if it does feel recycled from bits and pieces of such recent animated landmarks.” Stephen Holden, film critic for The New York Times, positively wrote in his review that “Visually Megamind is immaculately sleek and gracefully enhanced by 3-D.” Entertainment Weekly film reviewer Owen Gleiberman graded the film a B+ described the film as “too goofy-surreal to pack a lot of emotional punch, but it’s antically light on its feet, with 3-D images that have a lustrous, gizmomad sci-fi clarity.” Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote a mixed review stating “this raucous 3D animated fun house lacks in originality, (The Incredibles and Despicable Me), it makes up for in visual and vocal wit.” Betsy Sharkey of The Los Angeles Times gave the film mixed review as well writing “Just as Megamind struggles to find his center, at times, so does the film.” 8
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• Will Ferrell ... Megamind (voice) • Brad Pitt ... Metro Man (voice) • Tina Fey ... Roxanne Ritchi (voice) • Jonah Hill ... Tighten (voice) • David Cross ... Minion (voice) • Justin Theroux ... Megamind's Father (voice) • Ben Stiller ... Bernard (voice) • Jessica Schulte ... Megamind's Mother (voice)
• Tom McGrath ... Lord Scott/Prison Guard (voice) • Emily Nordwind ... Lady Scott (voice) • J.K. Simmons ... Warden (voice) • Ella Olivia Stiller ... Schoolchild (voice) • Quinn Dempsey Stiller ... Schoolchild (voice) • Brian Hopkins ... Prisoner (voice) • Christopher Knights ... Prison Guard (voice) • Mike Mitchell ... Father in Crowd (voice) • Jasper Johannes Andrews ... Crying Baby (voice) • Jack Blessing ... Newscaster (voice) • Stephen Kearin ... Mayor (voice) 10
DIRECTOR • Tom McGrath PRODUCERS • Lara Breay ... producer • Denise Nolan Cascino ... producer • Stuart Cornfeld ... executive producer • Holly Edwards ... associate producer • Ben Stiller ... executive producer Producer Ben Stiller, who was originally considered for the title role, has a cameo in this film as Megamind’s father. 11
PRODUCTION MANAGERS • David Isetta ... production supervisor • Diana K. Lee ... production supervisor • Camille Leganza ... production supervisor • Maude Lewis ... production manager • Kelly Matthews ... production supervisor • Trinity Murphy ... production supervisor • Steven Schweickart ... production supervisor • Kate Spencer ... production manager Guillermo del Toro, who directed the “Hellboy” series, assisted in editing the film to make it more exciting 12
ART DEPARTAMENT • • • • • • • • •
Vlad Bina ... 3D concept designer David G. Derrick Jr. ... storyboard artist Goro Fujita ... visual development artist Kory Heinzen ... visual development artist Chin Ko ... visual development artist Jonathan B. Lee ... research assistant Sunil Pant ... visual development artist Doug Pierce ... set designer Jason William Scheier ... visual development artist
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1. “Giant Blue Head” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 2. “Tightenville (Hal’s Theme)” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 3. “Bad to the Bone” by George Thorogood and the Destroyers 4. “Stars and Tights” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 5. “Crab Nuggets” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 6. “A Little Less Conversation (Junkie XL Remix)” by Elvis Presley 7. “Mel-On-Cholly” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 8. “Ollo” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 9. “Roxanne’s Theme” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 10. “Alone Again (Naturally)” by Gilbert O’Sullivan 11. “Drama Queen” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 12. “Rejection in the Rain” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 13. “Lovin’ You” by Minnie Riperton 14. “Black Mamba” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 15. “Game Over” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 16. “I’m the Bad Guy” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe 17. “Evil Lair” by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe
Other songs used in the film include: * “Highway to Hell” by AC/DC * “A Little Less Conversation” by Elvis Presley * “Crazy Train” by Ozzy Osbourne * “Mr. Blue Sky” by Electric Light Orchestra * “Back in Black” by AC/DC * “Bad” by Michael Jackson * “Welcome to the Jungle” by Guns N’ Roses 14
ANIMATION DEPARTMENT
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Mike Beaulieu ... animator Andy Bialk ... character designer Julien Bocabeille ... animator Chris Capel ... animator Katrina Conwright ... animator Louie del Carmen ... story artist Mark Donald ... supervising animator Scott Douglas ... animation technical director Christopher Ell ... final layout artist W. Jacob Gardner ... animator Shaila Haque ... technical director Tim Heitz ... story artist Mariko Hoshi ... animator Jeffrey Joe ... animator Jung Jin Kang ... modeler Morgan R. Kelly ... animator Luis Labrador ... senior modeler Scott Lafleur ... animator
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Suryaveer Singh Lodha ... layout intern Tommie Löfqvist ... animator Wesley Mandell ... animator Stephen Melagrano ... animator Steven J. Meyer ... animator Pia Miniati ... animation rig engineer Rani Naamani ... animator/character lead Nicasio Nakamine ... animation production assistant Brian Newlin ... layout artist Rebecca Perez ... animator Tyler Phillips ... animator Dan Pilgrim ... layout artist Adrian Pinder ... animation department: PDI/Dreamworks Ron Pucherelli ... animator Luke Randall ... animator Chris Reccardi ... character design Brian Riley ... layout artist Carlos M. Rosas ... lead character animator Ryan Savas ... story artist Jason Schleifer ... head of character animation 15
• H Magazine The Hollywood Magazine Area 31 Media Publishing Digital Issue 23 Year IV ISSN 1828 - 6437
All Rights Reserved to H Magazine 16
Marlon Raphael Munhoz Chaves DATE: June 15th, 2011 TIME: 03:24 pm VENUE: At home Thanks for seeing! Contact me:myinnerspace0703@gmail.com lilhawke0703@yahoo.com.br
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