Rise of the Guardians is a 2012 American animated fantasy action film directed by Peter Ramsey and written by David Lindsay-Abaire, based on the book series The Guardians of Childhood and the short film The Man in the Moon by William Joyce. Produced by DreamWorks Animation, the film stars the voices of Chris Pine, Alec Baldwin, Jude Law, Isla Fisher, and Hugh Jackman. The film tells a story about Guardians Santa Claus (Baldwin), the Tooth Fairy (Fisher), the Easter Bunny (Jackman) and the Sandman, who enlist Jack Frost (Pine) to stop Pitch Black (Law) from engulfing the world in darkness in a fight of dreams.
Rise of the Guardians premiered at the Mill Valley Film Festival on October 10, 2012, and was theatrically released in the United States by Paramount Pictures on November 21, and received mixed-to-positive reviews from critics. Despite grossing $306.9 million worldwide against a budget of $145 million, the film was deemed a box-office failure, as it lost the studio an estimated $87 million due to marketing and distribution costs. It was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film and the Annie Award for Best Animated Feature.
Plot
Jack Frost emerges from a frozen pond with amnesia and finds himself invisible to the mortal realm. While he knows the Man in the Moon played a role in his transformation, the Man does not tell him why he has been changed. Three centuries later, Nicholas St. North learns of the return of Pitch Black, who threatens to plague children with nightmares. North rallies his fellow Guardians, E. Aster Bunnymund, Sanderson Mansnoozie, and Toothiana, and they discover that Jack has been chosen to join their ranks. Jack is kidnapped by Bunny and transported to the North Pole, where he learns from North that every Guardian has a "center", something they foster in children. Jack knows nothing of his center and resists the call to become a Guardian.
Meanwhile, North receives a message from Toothiana that her palace is under attack. The Guardians and Jack Frost manage to chase away Pitch, but not before Pitch kidnaps Tooth's subordinate fairies and steals all of the teeth, weakening children's belief in Tooth. Jack learns that every baby tooth holds the childhood memories of its owner, and may help him find out more about his past, motivating him to help Toothiana. To counter Pitch's plan, the other Guardians and Jack embark on a mission to collect teeth from children themselves. In their quest, they visit Jamie Bennett, a young boy who, still clinging to his belief, sees all of them except for Jack. On their way back to the North Pole, Pitch's Nightmares attack the Guardians and Sandy is killed.
With Easter approaching, the Guardians travel to Bunny's Warren and assist in the egg-coloring preparations. A mysterious voice lures Jack into Pitch's lair, where he finds his teeth. Pitch distracts Jack long enough for the Nightmares to destroy all the Easter eggs, causing children to stop believing in Bunny. Ashamed, Jack flees to Antarctica, where Pitch breaks his magic staff and throws him into a chasm. Unlocking the memories within his teeth, Jack learns that he was once a mortal boy who died saving his sister from the frozen pond that he awakened from at the film's start, which caused the Man in the Moon to choose him as a Guardian. Inspired, he repairs his staff and rescues the kidnapped fairies.
Thanks to Pitch, every child in the world has stopped believing except Jamie, drastically weakening the Guardians. Finding Jamie's belief wavering, Jack makes it snow in his bedroom, restoring his faith in the Guardians and making Jamie the first person to believe in him. Jack realizes that his center is fun and uses it to gather Jamie's friends, play, and diminish their fear, which bolsters the Guardians and resurrects Sandy. The children's dreams prove stronger than the Nightmares, who turn on Pitch and drag him to the underworld. The Guardians celebrate their victory and Jack accepts his place as the Guardian of Fun.
Voice cast Chris Pine as Jack Frost: the Spirit of Winter. He is a teenage hellion who enjoys creating mischief and has no interest in being bound by rules or obligations; he just wants to use his staff to spread his winter magic for the sake of fun, but also wants to be believed in. Via his staff, he possesses potent cryokinesis. At the end of the film, Jack became the Guardian of Fun. Jude Law as Pitch Black / Boogeyman, the Nightmare King. He has dark hair and wears a black cloak. Despite being the literal embodiment of terror, at the resolution, he is scared of his own nightmares after being forgotten. Alec Baldwin as Nicholas St. North / Santa Claus, the leader of the Guardians, and the Guardian of Wonder. He lives at the North Pole in the Ice Castle and is served by loyal North Pole natives, the Yetis (who built the castle and workshop) and the Christmas Elves. He has a Russian accent/culture persona, resembling Ded Moroz. Isla Fisher as Toothiana / Tooth Fairy, called Tooth for short, the Guardian of Memories. Tooth is part human and part hummingbird, loosely resembling a Kinnari. Assisted by mice and mini fairies that are split-off extensions of herself, she collects the children's teeth, which hold their most precious memories. Tooth stores them in her palace and returns memories when they are needed the most. Hugh Jackman as E. Aster Bunnymund / Easter Bunny, called Bunny for short, the keeper and bringer of Easter eggs and Guardian of Hope. He shares Jackman's Australian accent. Dakota Goyo as Jamie Bennett, a child who has not given up on believing in the Guardians. Georgie Grieve as Sophie Bennett, Jamie's little sister Jacob Bertrand as Monty Dominique Grund as Cupcake Olivia Mattingly as Mary Frost, Jack's sister
Additionally, Sandman or "Sandy", the Guardian of Dreams and the oldest of the Guardians, appears, but does not speak, and instead he communicates through sand images that he conjures above his head.
Production In 2005, William Joyce and Reel FX launched a joint venture, Aimesworth Amusements, to produce CG-animated feature films, one of which was set to be The Guardians of Childhood, based on Joyce's idea. The film was not realized, but they did create a short animated film, The Man in the Moon, directed by Joyce, which introduced the Guardians idea, and served as an inspiration for the film.
Early in 2008, Joyce sold the film rights to DreamWorks Animation, after the studio assured him it would respect his vision for the characters and that he would be involved with the creative process. In November 2009, it was revealed that DreamWorks had hired Peter Ramsey to make his feature debut as director of what was then titled The Guardians, and playwright David Lindsay-Abaire to write the script, Lindsay-Abaire previously co-wrote the screenplay for Robots, which Joyce previously produced. The next month, Leonardo DiCaprio was announced to make his animated feature film debut as the lead character of the film—tentatively titled The Guardians—Jack Frost. DiCaprio would later leave the project for undisclosed reasons. Joyce acted as a co-director for the first few years, but left this position after the death of his daughter Mary Katherine, who died from complications relating to her brain cancer positive diagnosis in May 2010. Joyce continued to work on the film only as an executive producer, while Ramsey took the helm solo as a full-time director, making him the first African American to direct a big-budget CG animated film as well as making it one of the first DreamWorks films to have only one director instead of two and not have a co-director. As with some previous DreamWorks films, Guillermo del Toro came on board to join Joyce as an executive producer. Present almost from the beginning, he was able to help shape the story, character design, theme and structure of the film. He said he was proud that the filmmakers were making parts of the film "dark and moody and poetic," and expressed hope this might "set a different tone for family movies, for entertainment movies." The final title, Rise of the Guardians was announced in early 2011, along with the first cast.
Roger Deakins, the cinematographer who had already worked on a previous DreamWorks film, How to Train Your Dragon, advised on the lighting to achieve its real look. He selected photographic references for color keys, and during the production gave notes on contrast, saturation, depth of field and light intensity. The film contains a lot of special effects, particularly the volumetric particles for depicting Sandman and Pitch. For this, DreamWorks Animation developed OpenVDB, a more efficient tool and format for manipulating and storing volume data, like smoke and other amorphous materials. OpenVDB had been already used on Puss in Boots and Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted, and was released in August 2012 for free as an open-source project with a hope to become an industry standard.
Although the film is based on Joyce's book series, it contains differences from the books. The book series, begun in 2011, explains the origins of the characters, while the film takes place about 300 years after the books, and shows how the characters function in present time. Joyce explained, "Because I don't want people to read the book and then go see the movie and go, 'Oh, I like the book better,' and I also didn't want them to know what happens in the movie. And I also knew that during the progress of film production, a lot of things can change. So I wanted to have a sort of distance, so we were able to invoke the books and use them to help us figure out the world of the movie, but I didn't want them to be openly competitive to each other." The idea for the Guardians came from Joyce's daughter, who asked him "if he thought Santa Claus had ever met the Easter Bunny." The film includes a dedication to her, as well a song, "Still Dream," sung over the end credits.
Originally, the film was set to be released on November 2, 2012, but DreamWorks Animation pushed the film to November 21, 2012, to avoid competition with Pixar's upcoming film Monsters University, which in turn had been pushed to November 2, 2012, to avoid competition with The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2. Monsters University was then pushed to June 21, 2013, with Disney's Wreck-It Ralph taking its place.
Music
French composer Alexandre Desplat composed the original music for the film, which was released on November 13, 2012, by Varèse Sarabande. The score was recorded in London at Abbey Road Studios and Air Studios, and performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, with a choral contribution by London Voices. David Lindsay-Abaire wrote the lyrics for the end-credit song, "Still Dream", which was performed by soprano Renée Fleming. Stravinsky's "Firebird Suite" can also be heard during the scene where North first appears. This film marks the first time that a DreamWorks Animation film has not been composed or have any involvement from Hans Zimmer or a member of his Remote Control Productions family of composers (mainly John Powell, Henry Jackman, Lorne Balfe, Harry Gregson-Williams or his brother Rupert Gregson-Williams).
Release