LITTLE NEMO Is a Gorgeous Kids’ Fantasy of Pure Terror

For years here at Nerdist, we’ve been obsessed with scary kids movies, i.e. movies made for children specifically that were and often are still absolutely terrifying. When we were kids, they were everywhere! It’s a wonder any of us got any sleep at all when we were younger, and it probably explains a lot about us as people. But since the beginning of these conversations, our own illustrious Editor-in-Chief Rachel Heine has been singing the petrifying praises of an animated movie called Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland, which I had at the time never even heard of. So, for Rachel and this year’s essays, I’ve finally watched it and hoooooooooly crap.

The story behind Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland is fascinating and long. The short version is, Japanese producer Yutaka Fujioka wanted to make a film version of Winsor McCay’s classic comic strip about a boy who goes on adventures in his dreams. He tried to convince McCay’s descendants to give him the rights in the late ’70s and approached George Lucas, fresh off the success of Star Wars, to produce, though Lucas didn’t see much room for growth for the Nemo character. Looney Tunes‘ Chuck Jones turned the project down, Lucas collaborator Gary Kurtz was briefly a producer, and renowned author Ray Bradbury was among the people hired to write a screenplay. Fujioka also approached Studio Ghibli founders Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata about making a Little Nemo film, but they both left the project, which Miyazaki later called the worst experience of his life. The project eventually became a Japanese/American co-production after several starts and stops over the next decade, with various people such as Brad Bird, Chris Columbus, French comic book artist Moebius, conceptual artist Brian Froud, and several Walt Disney Studios animators all taking a crack. Eventually, the movie would be co-directed by Masami Hata and William Hurtz, with production entirely taking place at Fujioka’s Tokyo Movie Shinsha studio, fresh off the success of 1988’s Akira. And that’s really the first thing to notice about Little Nemo, that despite the long and troubled history of the project, the finished product is stunningly beautiful, with some of the smoothest animation I’ve ever seen in a film of this kind. Makes perfect sense all the animators had just done Akira. And the Disney influence is certainly there, from the character designs down to the hiring of Academy Award-winning songwriters Richard and Robert Sherman, who wrote just about every song you remember from a classic Disney movie.

Image: TMS/Hemdale Film Company

Kyle Anderson is the Associate Editor for Nerdist. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Twitter!

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