Toy Story
Toy Story premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on the 19th of November 1995. It marked a turning point for animation history as the first fully computer-animated feature film. Before this moment, Disney and other studios relied entirely on hand-drawn techniques. John Lasseter had spent years developing short films to prove that computers could tell emotional stories. His 1988 short Tin Toy won an Academy Award, catching the attention of Disney executives. The studio agreed to fund a full-length project based on that success. Pixar operated with a small team compared to traditional animation houses. Only 27 animators worked on the entire production while The Lion King required 800 staff members. This efficiency came from using specialized software like RenderMan to handle complex textures and lighting. Every leaf and blade of grass had to be created individually by digital artists. The result was a world that felt organic despite being built from code.
Disney executives halted production after screening the first half of the film on the 19th of November 1993. They called it the Black Friday Incident because the story reels were so disastrous. Peter Schneider stopped the project immediately after seeing the footage. Katzenberg asked why the reels failed and Thomas Schumacher replied that the characters lacked charm. Woody had become a mean tyrant instead of a relatable leader. Lasseter recalled feeling embarrassed by the unhappy tone of the script. Jobs personally funded the rewrite process while the crew made television commercials for income. Three months passed as writers Joel Cohen, Alec Sokolow, Andrew Stanton, and Joss Whedon rebuilt the narrative. They transformed Woody into a wise leader who genuinely cared about Andy. Buzz Lightyear also changed from a dim-witted character to one unaware he was a toy. The new script restored emotional depth to the relationship between the two protagonists. Production resumed in February 1994 with voice actors returning to record fresh lines. The team grew from 24 people to 110 employees during this critical period.
Tom Hanks voiced Woody despite initial hesitation from Disney executives. Lasseter believed Hanks could make even a despicable character appealing. He used a technique common at Disney studios by animating a vocal monologue from Turner & Hooch to test how the actor fit the role. Tim Allen accepted the part of Buzz Lightyear after Billy Crystal turned down the offer. Crystal later regretted his decision when seeing the finished film. Other actors considered included Robin Williams, Clint Eastwood, Bill Murray, and Chevy Chase. John Morris brought forty-five X-Men figures to an open casting call for young male voices. Pixar laughed when he dumped them all on the table instead of bringing just one toy. Wallace Shawn and Jim Varney were cast as Rex and Slinky Dog after Rick Moranis and John Cleese declined. Annie Potts played Bo Peep while Don Rickles provided the cynical voice of Mr. Potato Head. Every lead actor had never done an animated film before Toy Story. Their performances became central to the film's emotional resonance.
Pixar developed RenderMan software to assign surface textures and reflectivity properties to objects. The shading team led by Tom Porter used scans of real objects alongside procedural generation algorithms. Each character required unique motion controls coded into the system. Woody needed 723 motion controls including 212 for facial expressions alone. Animators spent one week per eight seconds of animation to sync mouth movements with recorded dialogue. Automatic lip syncing failed to convey proper emotion so they hand-posed every frame. The Render Farm used Sun Microsystems computers running around the clock to produce final frames. They rendered less than thirty seconds of film per day despite having hundreds of machines available. Eight hundred thousand machine hours were consumed during production. One hundred fourteen thousand two hundred forty frames of animation divided across fifteen hundred sixty-one shots. The layout department avoided sweeping camera shots popular at the time. Instead they emulated live-action filming techniques using virtual cameras programmed by Craig Good. This approach gave the world a sense of history through scuffed floors and banged-up doors.
Rotten Tomatoes gave Toy Story a rare approval rating based on professional reviews. Metacritic assigned a score of ninety-six out of one hundred indicating universal acclaim. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of A on their scale. Leonard Klady of Variety called the technique razzle-dazzle and unusual. Roger Ebert compared the visuals to Who Framed Roger Rabbit allowing viewers to see the universe differently. Richard Corliss of TIME claimed it was the year's most inventive comedy. Susan Wloszczyna of USA Today approved the selection of Hanks and Allen for lead roles. Kenneth Turan stated that starting with Tom Hanks made it one of the best voiced animated features in memory. Owen Gleiberman noted its purity combined with spring-loaded prankishness tickling adults more than children. The film ranked eighth in TIMEs list of Best Ten Films of 1995. It also appeared on Empire magazines list of five hundred greatest movies at number ninety-nine. In 2003 the Online Film Critics Society named it the greatest animated film ever made.
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Common questions
When did Toy Story premiere at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles?
Toy Story premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on the 19th of November 1995. This event marked a turning point for animation history as the first fully computer-animated feature film.
Why did Disney executives halt production of Toy Story on the 19th of November 1993?
Disney executives halted production after screening the first half of the film because they called it the Black Friday Incident due to disastrous story reels. Peter Schneider stopped the project immediately after seeing footage where characters lacked charm and Woody had become a mean tyrant instead of a relatable leader.
Who voiced Woody and Buzz Lightyear in the 1995 Pixar film Toy Story?
Tom Hanks voiced Woody despite initial hesitation from Disney executives while Tim Allen accepted the part of Buzz Lightyear after Billy Crystal turned down the offer. Every lead actor had never done an animated film before Toy Story and their performances became central to the film's emotional resonance.
How many machine hours were consumed during the production of Toy Story?
Eight hundred thousand machine hours were consumed during production using Sun Microsystems computers running around the clock. The Render Farm rendered less than thirty seconds of film per day despite having hundreds of machines available to process one hundred fourteen thousand two hundred forty frames of animation.
What approval rating did Rotten Tomatoes give to Toy Story upon its release?
Rotten Tomatoes gave Toy Story a rare approval rating based on professional reviews while Metacritic assigned a score of ninety-six out of one hundred indicating universal acclaim. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of A on their scale.