Rise of the Guardians is a 2012 American 3D computer-animated fantasy film based on William
Joyce's The Guardians of Childhood book series and The Man in the Moon short film by Joyce
and Reel FX.
Peter Ramsey directed the film, while Joyce and Guillermo del Toro were executive producers
with the voice talents of Chris Pine, Alec Baldwin, Hugh Jackman, Isla Fisher, and Jude
Law.
Produced by DreamWorks Animation and distributed by Paramount Pictures, it was released on
November 21, 2012 and received mixed to positive reviews, but was disappointing financially,
contributing to a studio writedown of $83 million for the quarter and the layoffs of
350 employees.
Set about 300 years after the book series, the film tells a story about Guardians Santa
Claus, the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and the Sandman, who enlist Jack Frost to
stop Pitch Black from engulfing the world in darkness.
The film was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film.
This is the last film by DreamWorks Animation to be distributed by Paramount Pictures.
Plot The spirit of winter Jack Frost is lifted
with amnesia from the depths of a frozen pond by the Man in the Moon only to discover no
one can see, hear, or touch him.
Three hundred years later at the North Pole, North better known as Santa Claus, becomes
aware that Pitch Black, the Boogeyman, has returned and is threatening the children of
the world.
After alerting fellow Guardians the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and the Sandman/Sandy
of the problem, North learns that Jack Frost has been selected by the Man in the Moon as
the newest Guardian.
Jack Frost, frustrated and hurt by centuries of isolation, declines the invitation, but
North persuades Jack Frost to cooperate by explaining their mission and the looming threat.
Meanwhile, Pitch Black and his Nightmare minions raid Tooth's palace, taking all the children's
teeth and the memories stored within.
He also captures Tooth's helper fairies except for a single fairy named Baby Tooth who is
rescued by Jack Frost.
Resentful that he himself is not believed in, Pitch plans to destroy children's faith
in the Guardians and thereby weaken them by preventing Tooth from doing her work.
To avert this, the Guardians travel the world collecting teeth, and promise Jack that when
they find Pitch, they will help him regain his own baby teeth and through them the memories
of his past life.
On the expedition, a young boy named Jamie Bennett is delighted to discover the Guardians
in his room.
He believes in all of them except for Jack, whom he cannot see.
Pitch learns of the Guardians' resistance and attacks Jack and Sandy.
Despite Jack's efforts to save him, Sandy is overwhelmed and seemingly killed by Pitch.
The dejected Guardians rally by helping Bunnymund prepare his eggs for Easter.
Although slightly complicated by the intrusion of Jamie's sister Sophie, the preparation
goes smoothly.
Jack takes Sophie home, but afterward a mysterious female voice lures him to Pitch's lair where
Tooth's fairies and the teeth are being held.
Pitch keeps him distracted with the promise of his teeth's memories, while Jack's absence
allows the Nightmares to raid Bunnymund's domain, shattering all the eggs, and destroying
the children's belief in the Easter Bunny.
After facing the disappointed Guardians, a despondent Jack departs in disgrace to Antarctica.
There, Pitch tempts him to join forces, but Jack refuses, claiming that he wants to be
loved, not feared.
In retaliation for rejecting the offer, Pitch threatens to kill Baby Tooth unless Jack relinquishes
the source of his power which is his staff.
Pitch breaks the staff and throws Jack and Baby Tooth down into an ice crevasse out of
anger, where Baby Tooth convinces Jack to unlock his memories in an attempt to counter
his despair.
Long ago, his memories teach him, he was a mortal teenage boy who died saving his little
sister from falling through the ice of the pond in which he awakened at the film's start.
Because of that sacrifice, the Man in the Moon changed him into a spirit and chose him
as a Guardian.
Inspired by the revelation, Jack restores his staff and returns to help the Guardians.
Due to the power of Pitch's Nightmares, only one child still believes.
Jack races to the boy first and strengthens Jamie's wavering faith in the Guardians, but
by creating snow in Jamie's room, he causes him to believe that Jack Frost is real.
Jamie is finally able to see him much to Jack's delighted surprise.
The weakened Guardians arrive to confront Pitch, while Jamie gathers his friends to
support them.
Pitch's powers prove no match against the children's faith, which allows the restored
Guardians to battle Pitch.
Sandy is resurrected by this belief and joins the fight, leaving Pitch defeated, the children's
faith restored, and Jack with believers of his own.
Upon seeing that he is no longer believed because of his defeat, Pitch attempts to escape,
but his Nightmares track down his fear and drag him away into his lair.
At this victory, Jack accepts his place as the Guardian of Fun and resolves to protect
the world's children with his new friends.
Cast Chris Pine as Jack Frost, the spirit of winter.
Jack Frost is a teenage hellion who enjoys creating mischief and has no interest in being
bound by rules or obligations; he just wants to spread his winter magic for the sake of
fun, but also wants to be believed in.
At the end of the film, Jack becomes the Guardian of Fun.
Alec Baldwin as North, the leader of the guardians, and the Guardian of Wonder.
He lives at the North Pole in the Ice Castle and is served by loyal North Pole natives,
the Yetis and the Christmas Elves.
He carries a Russian accent/culture persona.
Hugh Jackman as Bunnymund, the fabled keeper and bringer of Easter eggs and the Guardian
of Hope.
He has an Australian accent.
Isla Fisher as Tooth Fairy or Tooth for short, the mythical tooth collector and the Guardian
of Memories.
Tooth is part human and part hummingbird.
Assisted by mini fairies that are split-off extensions of herself, she collects the children's
teeth, which hold their most precious memories.
Tooth stores them in her palace and returns memories when they are needed the most.
" Jude Law as Pitch Black, the essence of fear
and the Nightmare King.
Dakota Goyo as Jamie Bennett, a child who has not given up on believing in the Guardians.
He also has a little sister named Sophie who wants to play with them.
The Sandman, or Sandy for short, the Guardian of Dreams is the oldest of the Guardians and
the first Guardian chosen by Man in the Moon.
He does not speak, but communicates through sand images that he conjures above his head.
Production In 2005, William Joyce and Reel FX launched
a joint venture, Aimesworth Amusements, to produce CG-animated feature films, one of
which was set to be The Guardians of Childhood, based on Joyce's idea.
The film was not realized, but they did create a short animated film, The Man in the Moon,
directed by Joyce, which introduced the Guardians idea, and served as an inspiration for the
film.
Early in 2008, Joyce sold the film rights to DreamWorks Animation, after the studio
assured him it would respect his vision for the characters and that he would be involved
with the creative process.
In November 2009, it was revealed that DreamWorks had hired Peter Ramsey to make his feature
debut as director of what was then titled The Guardians, and playwright David Lindsay-Abaire
to script.
Joyce acted as a co-director for the first few years, but left this position after the
death of his daughter Mary Katherine, who died of a brain tumor.
Joyce continued to assist as an executive producer, while Ramsey took over full directing,
making him the first African American to direct a big-budget CG animated film.
As with some previous DreamWorks films, Guillermo del Toro came on board as an executive producer.
Present almost from the beginning, he was able to help shape the story, character design,
theme and structure of the film.
He said he was proud that the filmmakers were making parts of the film "dark and moody and
poetic," and expressed hope this might "set a different tone for family movies, for entertainment
movies."
The final title, Rise of the Guardians was announced in early 2011, along with the first
cast.
Roger Deakins, the cinematographer who had already worked on the previous DreamWorks'
film, How to Train Your Dragon, advised on the lighting to achieve its real look.
He selected photographic references for color keys, and during the production gave notes
on contrast, saturation, depth of field and light intensity.
The film contains a lot of special effects, particularly the volumetric particles for
depicting Sandman and Pitch.
For this, DreamWorks Animation developed OpenVDB, a more efficient tool and format for manipulating
and storing volume data, like smoke and other amorphous materials.
OpenVDB had been already used on Puss in Boots and Madagascar 3, and was released in August
2012 for free as an open source project with a hope to become an industry standard.
Although the film is based on the Joyce's book series, it contains differences from
the books.
The book series, begun in 2011, explains the origins of the characters, while the film
takes place about 300 years after the books, and shows how the characters function in present
time.
Joyce explained, "Because I don't want people to read the book and then go see the movie
and go, 'Oh, I like the book better,' and I also didn't want them to know what happens
in the movie.
And I also knew that during the progress of film production, a lot of things can change.
So I wanted to have a sort of distance, so we were able to invoke the books and use them
to help us figure out the world of the movie, but I didn't want them to be openly competitive
to each other."
The idea for the Guardians came from Joyce's daughter, who asked him "if he thought Santa
Claus had ever met the Easter Bunny."
The film includes a dedication to her, as well a song, "Still Dream," sung over the
end credits.
Originally, the film was set to be released on November 2, 2012, but DreamWorks Animation
pushed the film to November 21, 2012 to avoid competition with Pixar's upcoming film Monsters
University, which in turn had been pushed to November 2, 2012 to avoid competition with
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2.
Monsters University was then pushed to June 21, 2013, with Wreck-It Ralph taking its place.
Soundtrack French composer Alexandre Desplat composed
the original music for the film, which was released on November 13, 2012 by Varèse Sarabande.
The score was recorded in London at Abbey Road Studios and Air Studios, and performed
by the London Symphony Orchestra, with a choral contribution by London Voices.
David Lindsay-Abaire wrote the lyrics for the end-credit song, "Still Dream," which
was performed by soprano Renée Fleming.
Stravinsky's Firebird Suite can also be heard during the scene where North first appears.
This film marks the first time that a DreamWorks Animation film has not been composed by either
Hans Zimmer or a member of his Remote Control Productions family of composers.
Release
Rise of the Guardians had its premiere on October 10, 2012, at The Mill Valley Film
Festival in Mill Valley, California, followed by the international premiere at The International
Rome Film Festival on November 13, 2012.
Under distribution by Paramount Pictures, the film was released on November 21, 2012,
in American theaters.
Digitally re-mastered into IMAX 3D, it was shown in limited international and domestic
IMAX theaters.
It was the second film released in the firm Barco's Auro 11.1 3D audio format, after Red
Tails.
The film was also shown in Dolby Atmos, a surround sound technology introduced in 2012.
Rise of the Guardians was the last DreamWorks Animation film distributed by Paramount, as
DreamWorks has signed a five-year distribution deal with 20th Century Fox, starting in 2013
with The Croods.
Home media Rise of the Guardians was released on Blu-ray
and DVD on March 12, 2013.
This was the last DreamWorks Animation home media release to be distributed by Paramount
Home Entertainment, since 20th Century Fox announced its distribution agreement with
DreamWorks Animation a few months before the theatrical release.
The film was more successful at home media sales than at the box office, having at the
end of the second quarter of 2013 "the highest box office to DVD conversion ratio among major
releases."
In the first quarter of 2013, it sold 3.2 million home entertainment units worldwide,
and in the second quarter 0.9 million units, for a total of 4.1 million units.
As of August 2013, 2 million DVDs were sold domestically.
It was re-released on DVD on November 5, 2013 and comes with a wind-up marching elf toy.
Reception Critical response
Rise of the Guardians received mixed to positive reviews from critics.
Based on 144 reviews, the film holds a rating of 74% on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes,
with an average rating of 6.6/10.
The site's critical consensus reads: "A sort of Avengers for the elementary school set,
Rise of the Guardians is wonderfully animated and briskly paced, but it's only so-so in
the storytelling department."
Another review aggregator, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 top
reviews from mainstream critics, calculated a score of 57 based on 34 reviews, or "Mixed
or average."
The film earned an "A" from audiences polled by CinemaScore.
Carrie Rickey of The Philadelphia Inquirer gave the film three-and-a-half out of four
stars and found the film's characters to have "a primal familiarity, as though they were
developed by a tag team of Maurice Sendak and Walt Disney."
Olly Richards of Empire wrote, "It's gorgeously designed, deftly written and frequently laugh-out-loud
funny.
For child or adult, this is a fantasy to get lost in."
The Washington Post's Michael O'Sullivan also gave the film a positive review and said,
"Thoughts become things.
That's the message of Rise of the Guardians, a charming if slightly dark and cobwebbed
animated feature about how believing in something makes it real, or real enough."
Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three stars and wrote in his review,
"There's an audience for this film.
It's not me.
I gather younger children will like the breakneck action, the magical ability to fly and the
young hero who has tired of only being a name."
Though he did say, "Their parents and older siblings may find the 89-minute running time
quite long enough."
Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter called the film "a lively but derivative 3D storybook
spree for some unlikely action heroes."
Conversely, Justin Chang in Variety said, "Even tots may emerge feeling slightly browbeaten
by this colorful, strenuous and hyperactive fantasy, which has moments of charm and beauty
but often resembles an exploding toy factory rather than a work of honest enchantment."
Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal found that the film "lacks a resonant center,"
and that the script, "seems to have been written by committee, with members lobbying for each
major character, and the action, set in vast environments all over the map, spreads itself
so thin that a surfeit of motion vitiates emotion."
Box office Rise of the Guardians grossed $103,412,758
in North America, and $203,528,912 in other countries, for a worldwide total of $306,941,670.
In North America, the film opened to $32.3 million over its extended five-day weekend,
and with $23.8 million over the three-day weekend, it reached fourth place behind The
Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2, Skyfall, and Lincoln.
The film's opening was the lowest debut for a DreamWorks Animation film since Flushed
Away.
While the film did gross more than its $145 million budget, it still did not turn a profit
for DreamWorks Animation due to its high production and marketing costs, forcing the studio to
take an $83 million write-down.
This marked the first time that the studio had lost money on an animated film since Sinbad:
Legend of the Seven Seas.
As a result of this combined with other factors, in February 2013, the studio announced it
was laying off 350 employees as part of a company-wide restructuring.
Accolades The Rome Film Fes­ti­val and Vanity Fair
magazine awarded the new Vanity Fair International Award for Cinematic Excellence in November
2012 to Rise of the Guardians.
The film also received the Hollywood Ani­ma­tion Award at the 16th Annual Hollywood Film Festival,
held on October 22, 2012.
Video game
A video game based on the film was released by D3 Publisher on November 20, 2012 in North
America, and released on November 23, 2012 in Europe.
It allows gamers to lead the Guardians in their battle against Pitch.
The game is a 3D beat-em-up, where the player travels through each of the worlds: Burgess,
North Pole, Bunnymund Valley, Tooth Palace, and Sandman's Ship, in order to fight Pitch's
army of Nightmares.
The player can switch between all five guardians at any time, and freely customize their powers,
and they learn new special abilities as they level up.
All the game versions support up to 4 player gameplay.
It is available on the Wii, Wii U, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS.
Possible sequels After the release of the film, the creators
of Rise of the Guardians expressed hope that the strong A-Cinemascore average for the film
and an enthusiastic word-of-mouth would gather support for the "chance to make a sequel or
two."
Author and co-producer of the series, William Joyce, also mentioned in March 2013 that he
was still in talks about a sequel with DreamWorks Animation: "There is something that we are
proposing that we hope they will want to do."
References
External links Official website
Rise of the Guardians at the Internet Movie Database
Rise of the Guardians at the Big Cartoon DataBase Rise of the Guardians at Rotten Tomatoes
Rise of the Guardians at Box Office Mojo