Aardman announces new slate

Films about pirates, cats and Santa are on the way from the Wallace and Gromit gang.

Jun 18 2007

The clever boys and girls of Aardman Animation have announced a slate of new films in development, including a Christmas flick from 'Borat' writer Peter Bayhnam and Peter Lord's return to direction with a pirate flick.

Bayhnam's 'Operation Rudolph' will document the military-like precision with which Santa and his elves deliver presents to the children of the world on Christmas Eve.

And Lord will be directing his first feature since 'Chicken Run' in the shape of an adaptation of Gideon Defoe's cult book 'The Pirates!'. The bonkers book follows the adventures of the Pirate Captain, Charles Darwin and the Elephant Man as they try to save the last dodo from being eaten by Queen Victoria, and Lord will be co-writing the script with Defoe and TV writers Andy Riley and Kevin Cecil.

Another project that sounds like it could be a winner is 'The Cat Burglars', a stop-frame animation about stray cats stealing milk. 'Curse of the Were-Rabbit' director Steve Box will helm the pic, which will combine the comedy action of Wallace and Gromit with the effortless cool of Tarantino and 'Ocean's Eleven'.

'I'm passionate about matching the brilliance of Aardman's film-makers with the very best talent in British comedy screen-writing' said Aardman's creative director Sarah Smith. 'This is an interesting time in the animation industry - while there is clearly still a big appetite among cinema goers for great animated films, there is a feeling of sameness about much of the product coming out of the industry at present, in terms of their stories.

'I think there's a great opportunity to excite audiences by raising the stakes in terms of the quality, intelligence and variety of the stories our animated films tell and the genres they inhabit. I'd like to help put Aardman at the forefront of this.'