Alright Swan Princess fans, your 14-year wait for another Swan Princess film is coming to an end! It appears last month, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and Nest Entertainment quietly released the trailer to its fourth Swan Princess film, a direct-to-DVD called The Swan Princess Christmas. And get this: it’s CGI.
Yes, you heard me correctly: the film is in CGI. And very poor CGI at that. The Swan Princess Christmas suffers from the main problem that comes from converting 2D characters to 3D in that they don’t look anything like the originals! Derek looks decent ok, but Odette especially looks like an entirely different person.The CGI looks unfinished and raw (much like the Wreck-It Ralph test screening that showed the film in a very unpolished form). The character movements are stiff and lack finesse.
I’ve always been a fan of the first Swan Princess film, but unfortunately the quality of the sequels make them really hard to watch. But I would gladly trade this CGI to go back to even the quality of the traditionally animated sequels. The trailer is painful to watch and I blame the jarring, cheap-looking animation. I get why Richard Rich wanted to do this: there’s easy money in Christmas films because they find their way back on the shelf every year. But really? This?
The Swan Princess Christmas is “a festive musical that follows the return of Princess Odette and Prince Derek as they celebrate their first Christmas together.” The film seems pretty unoriginal as it brings back the first film’s villain Rothbart in ghost form (even the second film did something like this but it was a female-replica of Rothbart). They just can’t get away from that guy, can they?
The DVD will contain a number of features such as a a storybook read-a-long, as well as sing-a-long videos to “Deck the Halls” and “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing.” The movie will also feature a song by America’s Got Talent star, Anna Graceman called “Season of Love.” Don’t forget to check out the making of the song and music video on the DVD for that one.
The screenplay was written by Brian Nissen alone with the producers Richard Rich and Seldon Young. The music will be written by 8-time Grammy award nominee, Vassel Benfords.
Check out the trailer for yourself below. And let us know your thoughts in the comments! What are you thoughts about this fourth Swan Princess film? Will you be buying it?
A Swan Princess Christmas hits stores November 6, 2012. You can buy it on Amazon.com.
