Miramax gets animated

Wanting to get a piece of the lucrative animated feature pie, Miramax Films
has announced their acquisition of worldwide distribution rights to the
animated musical fairy tale, "The Adventures of Tom Thumb and Thumbelina."
The film is being produced at Hyperion Studios, known for other animated
works such as "Life with Louie," "Bebe's Kids" and HBO's "Happily Ever
After: Fairy Tales for Every Child." The film features the voices of Elijah
Wood as Tom Thumb and Jennifer Love Hewitt as Thumbelina. The story
follows the adventure of these two tiny people who are separated from their
families when their tiny village is ravaged by a giant. When they find
their way home fifteen years later, they discover that they are actually a
prince and princess who were betrothed to each other in childhood. The
original script by Willard Carroll, based on classic characters created by
Hans Christian Anderson, is being directed by Glenn Chaika. Will Finn,
Tony-winning composer of "Falsettos," is writing the music for the film,
which is being produced by Tom Wilhite and Hyperion. Other voices include
Alex Boyd, Peter Gallagher, Rachel Griffiths, Robert Guillaume, Jane
Leeves, Esai Morales, Bebe Neuwirth, Emma Samms and Jon Stewart. "Hyperion
has a long history of quality animation and I'm happy that we're teaming up
with them on this extraordinary project," said Miramax Senior Vice
President for Acquisitions and Co-Productions, Jason Blum. No release dates
have yet been announced for the film. Miramax is also working on preparing
an English-language version of Hayao Miyazaki's animated Japanese box
office phenom, "The Princess Mononoke."