The Lego Movie

The Lego Movie is a 2014 live action/computer-animated adventure comedy film co-produced by Warner Animation Group, Village Roadshow Pictures, Lego System A/S, Vertigo Entertainment, and Lin Pictures, and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. It was written and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller from a story they co-wrote with Dan and Kevin Hageman, based on the Lego line of construction toys. The film stars the voices of Chris Pratt, Will Ferrell, Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett, Nick Offerman, Alison Brie, Charlie Day, Liam Neeson, and Morgan Freeman. A collaboration between production houses from the United States, Australia, and Denmark, its story focuses on Emmet Brickowski (Pratt), an ordinary Lego minifigure who helps a resistance movement stop a tyrannical businessman (Ferrell) from gluing everything in the Lego world into his vision of perfection. Plans of a feature film based on Lego started in 2008 following a discussion between producers Dan Lin and Roy Lee, before Lin left Warner Bros. to form his own production company, Lin Pictures. By August 2009, it was announced that Dan and Kevin Hageman had begun writing the script. It was officially green-lit by Warner Bros. in November 2011 with a planned 2014 release date. Chris McKay was brought in to co-direct in 2011 with Lord and Miller, and later became the film's animation supervisor. The film was strongly inspired by the visual aesthetic and stylistics of Brickfilms and qualities attributed to Lego Studios sets. While Lord and Miller wanted to make the film's animation replicate a stop motion film, everything was done through computer graphics, with the animation rigs following the same articulation limits actual Lego figures have. While primarily an animated film, it has several live action scenes in the real world. Much of the cast signed on to voice the characters in 2012, including Pratt, Ferrell, Banks, Arnett, Freeman, and Brie, while the animation was provided by Animal Logic, which was expected to comprise 80% of the film. The film was dedicated to Kathleen Fleming, the former director of entertainment development of the Lego company, who had died in Cancún, Mexico, in April 2013. The Lego Movie premiered in Los Angeles on February 1, 2014, and was released theatrically in the United States on February 7. It became a critical and commercial success, grossing $470.5 million worldwide against its $60–65 million budget, and received acclaim for its animation, writing, story, humor, score, and voice acting. The National Board of Review named The Lego Movie one of the top-ten films of 2014. It received a nomination for Best Original Song at the 87th Academy Awards, among numerous other accolades. The Lego Movie is the first entry in what would become the franchise of the same name, which includes three more films—The Lego Batman Movie, The Lego Ninjago Movie (both 2017), and The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part (2019).