Word: toy
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Fast forward to the early '80s. Now defunct Coleco, an electronic-toy company, noticed that unique, arty dolls made in Georgia and first sold at fairs had developed celeb cache. Amy Carter and Burt Reynolds were seen with them. Real People did a segment (bonus points if you remember host Sarah Purcell). Coleco began aggressively pushing the Cabbage Patch dolls--it sent them directly to reporters, a relatively new technique. Of course the Cabbage Patch Kids eventually sold well (more than $700 million) because kids liked them. But the adult hook--reporters thought the dolls looked "traditional," like the ones...
These past toy trends began with at least some kid's interest--be it Amy Carter's or Parker O'Donnell's. In fact, Tyco had sold some 400,000 Tickle Me Elmos before Rosie flacked them. (It has sold 10 million since.) But it remains to be seen whether kids will like all the Furbies their parents are trying so hard to find. Furby appeared too late to join in toy contests, and most kids won't have them in hand until late December...
...insurgents are goateed, stock-optioned tech-heads armed with graphics software and high-powered workstations. Once upon a time, animated movies were the sole domain of winsome beauties and fearsome beasts, all lovingly drawn by hand. That era ended three years ago this month with the release of Toy Story, the first purely computer-generated feature and the only animated film to near the $200 million box-office mark since 1994's The Lion King...
Even as A Bug's Life debuts this week, Pixar is hard at work on Toy Story 2 and a project dubbed Monsters, Inc., about the creatures living beneath a child's bed. DreamWorks is hoping for Antz-size success with Shrek, set for 2000 and featuring an ogre who pines for a beauty (some things never change). Universal is working on a Frankenstein project with CGI pioneer Industrial Light & Magic. Warner Bros. is readying The Iron Giant, about a machine that befriends a boy in 1950s Maine. And although both of Disney's '99 releases, Tarzan and Fantasia...
...smooth, seamless look, for instance, of Toy Story's indoor scenes and plastic dolls--sorry, "action figures"--counted as dazzling effects in 1995. But before the film was even out, Pixar's digital warriors had moved on to the thornier challenges posed by A Bug's Life. "The more symmetrical the object, the easier it is for a computer to render," says John Lasseter, who directed both films. "The more organic, the more difficult...