DUMBO FLIES AGAIN!
He was the little elephant with giant dreams (and ears) the world fell in love with. Now there’s a live-action remake with ultra-modern special effects. Sacrilegious? Not on your Nellie!
THE WHIMSICAL story of a flying baby elephant melted hearts when it hit the big screen in 1941, and has been a family favourite ever since.
Now, 78 years on, a whole new generation of children are set to fall in love with the tiny elephant with the big ears with Disney’s liveaction remake of Dumbo. And thanks to an array of technical wizardry, the computeranimated junior jumbo looks just as real as his human co-stars.
So just what did it take to bring this £90 million epic to our screens?
From actors in purple suits covered in tennis balls to an RAF hangar and rumours of an on-set romance, ALISON BOSHOFF reveals the secrets of how Dumbo took flight — and all without a single real elephant . . .
THE BRITISH BOFFINS WHO MADE MAGIC
LIKE Disney’s 2016 remake of The Jungle Book, the computer-generated animals in Dumbo are hyper-realistic, but have been given human expressions. With his large, liquid, blue-green eyes, the adorable Dumbo has reduced preview audiences to tears.
But bringing Dumbo to life took some doing, with British visual effects firm Moving Picture Company — who won an Oscar for The Jungle Book and are working on this year’s Lion King remake — adding in all the CGI elements after the scenes had been shot.
For the actual takes, the cast came face to face with a range of models and human stand-ins.
Colin Farrell, who stars as former circus performer Holt Farrier, explained: ‘ We have a couple of people in green suits, and a couple in aluminium outlines of how big an elephant would be with eyes represented by little tennis balls.
‘The baby was green and the mama was purple, and I guess when they draw it, that’s how they separate it.’
In one scene where the elephants are seen walking off a train, the ramps were pulled down by a hydraulic pump to make it look as if they were bending under the beasts’ weight.
Other special effects included making the straw from which Dumbo first emerges move as if a real elephant was wriggling out.
Danny DeVito, who plays circus owner Max Medici, said: ‘There’s a fake trunk coming out, and the special effects people have little filaments that move the hay. And that’s really cool to watch.’
THERE’S AN ANIMAL RIGHTS AGENDA . . .
THE original film was a simple fable about an elephant who could fly, if only he believed in himself.
In the new film, the human storylines have been vastly expanded. Set in 1919, just after World War I, much of it is about the men who run rival circuses.
The question of whether it is right to exploit animals is also answered in a way that will appeal to modern sensibilities.
Farrell’s character is a war veteran who has lost an arm. ‘He was away for five years, and by the time he comes back, the two children have been raised by the circus and his wife has died,’ says Farrell. ‘So he is a single father illequipped to deal with parenthood or the changes in the circus.’
Holt’s friend Medici, in financial trouble, buys an elephant to try to bring in the crowds. Mrs Jumbo has baby Dumbo — and when it’s discovered he can fly, Medici thinks his troubles are over. However, the villainous V.A. Vandevere (Michael Keaton), wants Dumbo for his amusement park, Dreamland.
Farrell adds: ‘It’s a new narrative . . . There’s the shyster type of circus leader with a heart of gold, that’s Danny. Then there’s the evil, megalomaniacal owner of the really big fantastical circus.’
. . . BUT TIMOTHY MOUSE IS DROPPED
AFTER losing his mother in the original, Dumbo is helped by Timothy Mouse, who persuades him he can fly with the help of a ‘magic feather’. Yet Timothy doesn’t feature in this version. Instead it is Milly and Joe, the children of Holt Farrier, who discover that Dumbo can fly after he inhales a feather and, while sneezing it out of his trunk, becomes airborne.
ROLES FOR BATMAN AND THE PENGUIN
DUMBO is directed by Tim Burton, who revamped Alice In Wonderland into a billion- pound blockbuster in 2010; critics say he is about to repeat the trick.
Though Burton has a reputation for the Gothic and phantasmagorical, many of his films have scenes that touch the tear ducts.
Who can forget the magical moment in 1990’s edward Scissorhands where Johnny Depp, as edward, carves an ice sculpture and creates a blizzard under which Winona ryder dances? Describing his attraction to the Dumbo project, Burton said: ‘ It’s symbolic of things that don’t fit in, and trying to find your place in the world.
‘Also, circuses always seemed to have that kind of . . . you know, just weirdos from all over the world, and that was always appealing.’
CHILD STAR WITH A ‘LIONESS’ MUM
NICO PARKER, the 14-year-old daughter of British actress Thandie Newton and director Oliver Parker, makes her acting debut playing Milly Farrier. Finley Hobbins plays her brother, Joe.
‘At first it was nerve-racking remaking such a classic story,’ said Nico. ‘In the end, though, I