Short of impressive animation, this movie has it all. It’s got a great sense of humor. It’s got a wonderful sense of self-awareness. It’s got a surprisingly good plot with twists that you wouldn’t see coming. It’s got compelling stereotype-defying characters (aside from the cops, as Maven pointed out in their post (ACAB)). It’s got great musical numbers that are entertaining but don’t nearly overstay their welcome. It’s got a magnificent cast of voices in both the actors and singers.
The only thing it doesn’t have is impressive animation, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have competent animation. From what I’ve heard, the budget for the animation was so minimalistic that they literally outsourced to a studio that had never made a movie before, and even by that standard the animation is extremely good at carrying and conveying character personas and story.
What an incredible movie. It doesn’t even need a sequel. I love it.
The director said in an interview that the movies budget was around $8 million. It’s also worth noting that it was one of the first ever independently made CGI animated films ever. What they were able to do with that much was wildly good.
Wasn’t Antz the first?
I believe Antz is DreamWorks.
I think DreamWorks formed around Antz as it was Jeffrey Katzenberg’s feud with Disney that drove him to make the movie and then realized he needed money, so he called up David Geffen and Speilberg to pay for it, thus the SKG (their last names) part of DreamWorks.
Since DreamWorks was an unknown at that point, it was outside any studio. Just a deep pocketed independent.
I guess technically yeah. I double checked the Wikipedia just to be sure and it doesn’t list it as independent but also that’s Wikipedia so I didn’t exactly dig far. I’d probably count it tho.