It really was a smart move when Pixar and Disney merged with the Pixar people still being in control of what they do (with Steve Jobs the majority owner sitting on the Disney board and John Lasseter pretty much being in charge of everything). But not all is happy happy joy joy in the mouse house these days. Appearently there is some huge infighting going in between the marketing folks on the Disney side and the Pixar Side.
You see, that Pixar people are VERY unhappy with how the Disney folks handled the marketing for Ratatouille (one of the best films of the year). So, Pixar has taken their next film, WALL-E, out of their hands and will be overseeing the marketing of the film themselves. But man… it sounds like the Disney folks are NOT HAPPY about that at all. IMDB has this from an unnamed Disney source:
something that has apparently infuriated the Disney marketing staff. Hill quotes one unnamed studio insider as saying that Ratatouille “was a very difficult picture to sell during an incredibly competitive summer. … They’re now being complete bastards about the WALL-E trailer, insisting that only they know the proper way to promote their next picture. … But that’s okay. Let them call the shots on WALL-E’s marketing campaign. Next year, they’ll be the ones who’ll be taking the fall when that Andrew Stanton film doesn’t measure up to expectations.”
Ouch! I guess not is all well over at the big happy Disney/Pixar family. The folks at Disney should keep their mouths shut. While they are much bigger than Pixar… they need Pixar a whole hell of a lot more than Pixar needs them, and they’re all under one roof now so they should just learn to get along.
On the other side of things… the Disney source does have a point… as magnificent as Ratatouille was… it was a hard film to market… I mean… it’s about a Rat who cooks. How do you really pitch that? I guess the Pixar people had different ideas and thought they could have done it better… and with their track record, I’m inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt. We’ll just have to wait and see how Wall-E does I guess.
