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SCMP Reporter

WOODY, Buzz Lightyear and the rest of the gang from Toy Story, the latest box-office sensation in the US, would be very proud of their screen creator. At 38, Oscar-winning director John Lasseter still loves his toys.

  Sitting in a hotel suite last week to promote his debut feature film, the animator never stopped playing with Woody the cowboy on his lap as he gave his seventh interview of the day.

  'I love my movie, I love to talk about my movie and toys,' he said.

  'I always love toys and have a large toy collection myself. I think animators tend to be kids that never grew up, and they have this love of toys. So when it came the time to think about a story, the notion of toys came up.'   Scheduled for local release next February (its distributor Intercontinental Film Distributors believes it is best for the film to be shown during Chinese New Year), Toy Story has already grossed US$85 million (about HK$654 million) in 23 days in the US.

  Distributors are also quick to point out that the Walt Disney picture is the first full-length animated feature to be created and animated entirely by computers.

  However, film critics say it is the effective story telling, supported by the hi-tech computer graphics, which contributed to Toy Story's runaway success.

  Having Oscar-winning actor Tom Hanks, comedian Tim Allen and Don Rickles to do the voices also helped.

  Ever since Lasseter completed Tin Toy - a computer animated feature about a living toy soldier which earned him an Oscar for the Best Animated Short Film in 1989 - he knew there was more scope to the theme of toys having a life of their own.

  'Most kids have at one time or another thought their toys were alive or wished their toys were alive,' he said. 'I always feel sorry when I see a toy that has got lost.'   Written with Pete Docter, Joe Ranft and Andrew Staton, the story is cleverly told from the toys' viewpoint.

  Cowboy Woody, a smart pull-string marionette, is owned by Andy and has always been the boy's favourite. In his world, Woody remains the leader of his pack, which includes Mr Potato Head, Slinky Dog, Rex the dinosaur, and his sweetheart, Bo Peep. However, his leadership is threatened by the arrival of Buzz Lightyear, a galactic superhero with an arsenal of flashy gadgets.

  Will Andy dump his longtime favourite cowboy for the more flashy spaceman?   Lasseter said ideas for the story came mostly from the life experiences of the writers themselves, while many characters were inspired by his childhood toy box.

  'The fact that Woody is a pull-string doll is based on one of the early toys I had as a kid. Casper the Friendly Ghost was the toy I slept with and was a pull-string toy.'   There is also a tale behind the creation of Sid, the obnoxious kid next door whose favourite pastime is to mutilate his, and his sister's, toys.

  '[Andrew] Staton actually took a G I Joe and put a big firecracker on its back,' Lasseter said. 'He got it in a running position and went, 'go Joe, you are never going to make it'. And it blew up.

  'When I heard that, I thought that was sick. But on the other hand, that is the introduction of the kid next door.

  'Can you imagine being a toy, watching someone doing that?'   WHEN Lasseter first presented his idea to Disney 'at a 7.00am meeting', the financier of the picture liked the idea right away. 'So it was not a hard sell,' he said.

  During the 41/2-year making of Toy Story, Lasseter said the most difficult part was to develop characters that were strong and appealing. But he added that the good cast really helped.

  'As far as the actors go, it was very challenging for them,' the director said. 'They have a lot of inspiration in them.

  'The voices were recorded prior to production so they had nothing to look at. I didn't tell them how to say their lines but I had to paint a picture of the scene and its atmosphere and try to give them as much information as possible.

  'Tom [Hanks] said it was the hardest acting job he ever had. It was 10 four-hour recording sessions over two years for the main two actors. That is very different from doing two scenes per day.

  'I think I wore out my actors . . . they were left emotionally crippled.'   Hanks is excellent in his role as Woody - someone who is sincere but who has his weaknesses.

  'When Woody makes the wrong decision, I wanted to make the audience feel for the characters and say, 'Woody, don't do that, it's wrong',' he said.

  'With Tim Allen, I love his TV show Home Improvement. Originally Buzz Lightyear was a pompous spaceman. Then [Allen] played it much better than we were hoping. He made Buzz kind of a regular guy.'    Of course, one of the film's great selling points is that it is the first fully computer-animated feature. Does Lasseter believe that computer technology will eventually replace traditional hand-drawn animation? And which is better?   'What is better? Writing with a pen and paper or word processor?' Lasseter asked.

  'It's the same thing. It's not whether you use a pencil or a computer. It's what's in the content, the story and character.

  'This medium is not going to replace hand-drawn animation.'   However, he acknowledged that the new medium could produce effects which traditional animation could not.

  'Things like Woody's denim jeans, plaid shirt, boots . . . also the dimension quality, the shade, the shadow, lighting all that.

  'These are all extras which would be impossible to draw.'   On the other hand, there are areas which computer graphics cannot produce.

  'Like in Pocahontas, the character has long hair, it looks glossy, the skin is very organic. Computer graphics tend to make things look like they are made out of plastic.

  'That's why in Toy Story, we stylised the dogs, the characters so it feels like they are of another world. But we are not trying to reproduce reality.'   What do look realistic are the lively facial expressions on the characters.

  'Drawn animation deals with drawings on paper and the animators create all their expressions,' Lasseter said.

  'With computer animations, you have to create a model with a lot of controls that can rotate an arm or a little finger.

  'Then the animator will manipulate and change the position of the controls of the model in each frame. On Woody's face, if you look at the shape of his eyebrows, the eyes and mouth, there are 212 controls. Buzz has close to 200.

  'We knew that to have a range of emotions is important for the characters so we really had to find all the possible expressions.

  'I often do expressions for the animators, that is why some people say Buzz looks like me.' 



Woody calls the tune in Toy town