Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Lilo & Stitch chase sequence



The big chase sequence in Lilo & Stitch went through some really incredible changes before actually making it to the screen. Initially, Stitch and the gang had 'hijacked' a 747 to rescue Lilo. The chase sequence proceeded through downtown Honolulu, where they smashed into hi-rise buildings and generally tore things up. I remember all to well, the morning of September 11th, as I watched the events unfold on television, somewhere in the back of my head a little voice said "Oh my God, we are going to have to change that entire chase sequence...!" Small worry to think about in the face of such cataclysmic events, but sure enough, within 24 hours, we were meeting to discuss how to change an entire FINISHED chase sequence. A new spaceship was designed and modeled, and we swapped out downtown Honolulu for a mountainous region of Kauai. Within one month, the entire sequence was re-done, with no more hijacked planes running into hi-rise buildings.

In the original sequence, the big fat sun-burned guy with the ice cream cone, was at a cross walk in Honolulu, when the wing tip of the 747 knocked his chocolate chip pistachio ice cream off of his cone. We painstakingly replaced the 747 footage with the new red spaceship, seated the guy on a beach, and successfully splattered his ice cream just like we had in the original sequence. Mission accomplished.

1 comment:

John David Thornton said...

This is a great weblog Joe!
I really like your flash animations.
Love the exaggerated hangtimes and ensuing downward plunging in the splashes.
Drop me a line when I can get an autographed copy of the book.
Peace.
Jack