A Little Book with a Big Message: Carlos Saldanha Talks ‘Ferdinand’ | ANIMATIONWorld
AnimationWorld Magazine — December 15, 2017
A Little Book with a Big Message: Carlos Saldanha Talks ‘Ferdinand’
Newly arrived in theaters, Blue Sky Studios and 20th Century Fox’s CG-animated feature Ferdinand adapts the beloved story of the giant bull who prefers flowers to fighting that has captured the hearts of millions since it was first told in the 1936 book “The Story of Ferdinand” by author Munro Leaf and illustrator Robert Lawson.
The pacifist tale was first adapted for the big screen by Walt Disney in his 1938 Oscar-winning short, Ferdinand the Bull, with Disney himself voicing the role of Ferdinand’s mother. But now, Carlos Saldanha, the Academy Award-nominated creator and director of the Rio series and director of many of the Ice Age movies, has expanded the simple story to include a cast of vibrant characters set against a gorgeously rendered backdrop of sun-drenched Spain.
Ferdinand centers on the adventures of a peace-loving bull (voiced by John Cena), who is adopted as a pet by a kindly farmer and adoring his daughter. However, Ferdinand’s idyllic life changes after he’s mistaken for a vicious beast and is taken away to the last place on earth he wants to be, a bull training camp. But Ferdinand is determined to get back home. Along the way, the kind-hearted bull makes many friends and changes the lives of those he meets. But there still one great obstacle he’ll have to overcome: in the film’s thrilling climactic scene, Ferdinand has to face the matador El Primero in a packed arena, but he valiantly stays true to his peaceful nature, and inspires all those around him.
“The book was little but the message was big,” Saldanha says of his approach to developing the story. “The first thing, before I even engaged in making the movie, was that I wanted to meet the family who owned the rights to the estate. Because I had never adapted anything before! All my previous movies were original ideas that we came up with, and we worked together to do it. This one was a book that was beloved. It carried a lot of weight. At first, I was a little scared about it,” the Brazilian director admits.
