Courtesy of and © 1999 Warner Bros.

I magine: An American animated feature with no song-and-dance routines. No goofy sidekick characters. No foppish villains. No fart gags. And no condescending to the audience.

This is the kind of film many in the animation industry dreams to work on, in an atmosphere where the studio allows creativity to flourish, under the guidance and vision of an experienced, talented director. No committee approvals. No micro-management. Just teamwork, bringing to life a compelling, entertaining story.

A One Man Army
It's a revolutionary approach in today's animation industry, one that Brad Bird had to sell to skeptical executives at Warner Bros., who had been burned by the dismal failure of Quest for Camelot.

"I'm interested in showing that animated films are films first, and animation second," Bird says. "We want to have something for adults, as well as children. Animation is storytelling. Storytelling can be anything. Hopefully, The Iron Giant is a step in that direction.

"I just pitched them the idea of, 'What if a gun had a soul?' They saw the dramatic possibilities in that idea. I pitched them the story line, the way I saw it, and they went for it."

Bird notes The Iron Giant differs in many ways from contemporary animated features. "It's wide screen rather than being 1:8:5. It's a story that not very many people know and certainly this is a very different version from the book [The Iron Man, by British author Ted Hughes], even if you have read it. It takes place during this century, in the not-too-distant past, using the Cold War as a backdrop.

"It's also like the old Walt Disney films, in that they had moments of quiet and moments that were very character-based. Slower-paced moments as well as faster-paced moments.

"Something that bothers me about film in general these days -- and this goes for animation as well -- is this notion that something has to be in your face every second. There has to be activity or sound effects or cuts or music blaring. It's almost as if the audience has the remote and they're going to change channels. It's an attitude of panic, for short attention spans, rather than assuming the audience doesn't have a short attention span and can get engaged in the story, and get involved in the quieter pleasures of character and milking the moment."

Bird also points out, "We don't have the obnoxious celebrity sidekick, the goofy sidekick. We don't have five tunes. And we don't have a foppish villain."

Bird admits that the executives at Warner Bros. had concerns that the film had few characters to exploit as merchandise. "I know that they were concerned about that, and they did make suggestions that I add more characters and pets and sidekicks to make it more merchandisable in their eyes. I just said the story wasn't about that. If they were interested in telling the story, they should let it be what it wants to be."

Bird credits the studio for seeing things his way, naming Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Courtney Vallenti, and earlier in the production, Billy Gerber (who has since moved on to another position at the studio). "If you gave Lorenzo and Courtney a good argument, they'd listen to it."

A Quest For Something Better
Bird also had to overcome the stigma of the previous animated film, Quest for Camelot, whose cost overruns and production nightmares made Warners reconsider their commitment to feature animation.

"In some ways, there was a stigma," Bird says, "and in some ways it gave us an opportunity. They were trying to do a very big thing to set up an animation company from scratch. They and everyone else tries to follow the Disney model, not only in terms of the story, but also the method by which it was produced. The Disney model is sort of a micro-managed thing, where every single decision is combed over by a huge number of people. It works very well for Disney, but I don't think it worked very well for Warner Bros. They had more management than they had artists, almost, during Quest for Camelot. It was a troubled production. I don't think Warner Bros. was ultimately very satisfied with the result.