JM

Yeah, I think it was harder in some ways.

RC

Although I think we thought of it from the story standpoint as an action adventure movie, and the problem with that is that I think that the action-adventure genre has not really done that well. There was SINBAD and ATLANTIS and FINAL FANTASY. I mean we thought of it before all of that obviously, but as an action-adventure we thought of the action sequences as replacing the musical set pieces, so in a way the action set pieces became the…I don’t know what you call it..

RC

Yeah…the anchors. I guess—

JM

And we thought that they would work the way they do in a lot of action movies. I think we could argue a little about that - whether it was our execution or the audience’s expectations - but seeing action adventure in animation may inherently be problematic if that’s its dominant thrust, in that if you have a choice – at least today’s audience – between seeing real actors in action adventure it may feel more compelling than drawings.

RC

Certainly PINOCCHIO has one of the great, great sequences with the Monstro sequence, and—

JM

That didn’t’ do well. It’s a hero’s journey, and it’s dark.

RC

We’re big fans of people like Steven Spielberg and James Cameron and aspects of the sort of movies that can work in ways like that.

JM

The irony is that when Jeffrey was deriding our version of ALADDIN he was saying “Guys, when Spielberg was making EMPIRE OF THE SUN, nobody was around to tell him Steven this doesn’t work. Guys, I got news for you, you just made EMPIRE OF THE SUN.�?

RC

He put a compliment ahead of that, though—

JM

I know…I know…�?I think of you as the Steven Spielbergs of animation.�? Yeah, you’re trying to get in the good stuff, I know. He always—

RC

I just want to balance it out-

JM

I’m more realistic, he’s more-

RC

But he did say-

JM

Let me get to my point, which is this, that the irony is that when we made TREASURE PLANET, possibly we actually did make EMPIRE OF THE SUN, in that it’s a boy’s journey from boy to man, and he’s got this relationship with John Malkovich who is this sort of thief guy…I mean it’s very tangential but there are lot of elements.