I think it says quite a bit about the world created by Dr. Suess that his books have such a dismal track record when it comes to live-action film adaptation, but such a stellar track record when it comes to animated adaptations. Imagine Entertainment's The Grinch and The Cat In The Hat are both downright awful, but Horton Hears A Who is just as good as the classic Chuck Jones cartoons. The iconic imagery of Suess's creation exists in a mind-bending, physics-warping reality that simply doesn't fit within the constraints of the tangible world.
Next year we'll be getting The Lorax from the same production company as the (from what I'm told) better than average Despicable Me. We've seen a few still images so far, but now we've got a full blown teaser to whet our appetites.
The trick with these movies is always a matter of filling out a 20 page book into a feature length story, which inherently means taking some fairly sizable liberties with the plot, but I unabashedly love what I'm seeing here. While the Lorax himself doesn't actually appear until about halfway through, I think that has more to do with marketing and framing the story. Yes, we'll actually be seeing The Once-ler as a fully realized person instead of just a pair of arms and a set of eyeballs, but those kinds of changes come with the territory. I also love the details of the post-truffula world, particularly the mechanical flowers and inflatable trees. And how about that spherical scooter he's riding around on? I want one!
And that's a pretty impressive voice cast they've assembled too. Danny DeVito sounds right on point, even if we still haven't heard the iconic "I speak for the trees" line. On a sidenote, I love the image of some kid growing up loving this Lorax movie, and then growing up to discover DeVito's brilliantly devious work on It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia.
