James and the Giant Peach is a 1996 musical fantasy film directed by Henry Selick, based on the 1961 novel of the same name by Roald Dahl. Combining live-action and stop-motion animation, it was produced by Tim Burton and Denise Di Novi, and starred Paul Terry as James. Joanna Lumley and Miriam Margolyes played James's self-absorbed Aunts Spiker and Sponge, respectively (in the live-action segments), with Simon Callow, Richard Dreyfuss, Jane Leeves, Susan Sarandon, and David Thewlis, as well as Margolyes, voicing his insect friends in the animation sequences.
Released on April 12, 1996 in the United States, the film received highly positive reviews, with many critics praising the story and visuals. Among the animators exposed to the book by Ranft was Henry Selick; while he enjoyed the book and thought about adapting it to screen for several years, he understood the obstacles doing so, such as the source material's dreamy nature, episodic structure, and the reputation of other Dahl books being so agitational some parts of the world banned them.
Felicity Dahl, Roald's widow and executor of his estate, began offering film rights to the book in the summer in 1992; among those interested included Steven Spielberg and Danny DeVito.
Walt Disney Pictures acquired the film rights to the book from the Dahl estate in 1992. Brian Rosen was hired as producer by Disney for his experience in animated projects like FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992) and live-action films such as Mushrooms (1995).
Dennis Potter was hired to write a draft. Rosen described it as "slightly black and bizarre", a tone Disney did not approve of, particularly with the sharks being Nazis. Once Potter died, Karey Kirkpatrick and Bruce Joel Rubin came in to write separate drafts, of which Kirkpatrick's was chosen. Unlike the novel, James's aunts are not killed by the rolling peach (though his parents' deaths occur as in the novel) but follow him to New York.
Before the start of production, Disney and Selick debated on whether the film should be live-action or stop-motion-animated, the company skeptical of the stop-motion solution. Selick had originally planned James to be a live actor through the entire film, then later considered doing the whole film in stop-motion; but ultimately settled on entirely live-action and entirely stop-motion sequences, to keep lower costs. The film begins with 20 minutes of live-action, but becomes stop-motion animation after James enters the peach, and then live-action again when James arrives in New York City (although the arthropod characters remained in stop-motion).
Songs
Release
The film was theatrically released on April 12, 1996.
Disney released the film worldwide except for a few countries in Europe, including the United Kingdom, where Pathé (the owner of co-producer Allied Filmmakers) handled distribution and sold the rights to independent companies. The only countries where Disney does not have control over the movie are the United Kingdom and Germany, where the film was released by Guild Film Distribution and Tobis Film respectively.
Box office
The film opened at the number 2 spot at the box office, missing out on the top spot to Primal Fear. The film took in $7,539,098 that weekend, and stayed in the top 10 for the next 5 weeks before dropping to 11th place. The film went on to gross $28,946,127 in the United States and Canada and $37.7 million worldwide, which against a budget of $38 million, made the film commercially a box office bomb.
Home media
The film was released on VHS on October 15, 1996. A digitally restored Blu-ray/DVD combo pack was released by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on August 3, 2010, in the United States.
Reception
The film received positive reviews during its initial release.
Though Roald Dahl refused numerous offers to have a film version of James and the Giant Peach produced during his lifetime, his widow, Liccy, approved an offer to produce a live-action version. She thought Roald "would have been delighted with what they did with James. It is a wonderful film."
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of based on reviews from critics, with an average score of . The website's critical consensus states: "The arresting and dynamic visuals, offbeat details and light-as-air storytelling make James and the Giant Peach solid family entertainment." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, lists the film with a weighted average score of 78 out of 100 based on 36 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale.
Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a positive review, praising the animated part, but calling the live-action segments "crude". Writing in The New York Times, Janet Maslin called the film "a technological marvel, arch and innovative with a daringly offbeat visual conception" and "a strenuously artful film with a macabre edge."
Awards and nominations
The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score, composed by Randy Newman. It won Best Animated Feature Film at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival.
{| class="wikitable"
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! Year !! Award !! Category !! Nominee !! Result
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| rowspan="8"|1996 || rowspan="7"|Annie Awards || Best Animated Feature || ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Directing || Henry Selick ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Music || Randy Newman ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Producing || Tim Burton<br />Denise Di Novi ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Storyboarding || Joe Ranft ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Voice Acting || Richard Dreyfuss ||
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| Best Individual Achievement: Writing || Karey Kirkpatrick<br />Jonathan Roberts<br />Steve Bloom ||
|-
| Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards || Best Animated Film || ||
|-
| rowspan="8"|1997 || Academy Awards || Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score || Randy Newman ||
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| Annecy International Animated Film Festival || Best Animated Feature Film || Henry Selick ||
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| Chicago Film Critics Association || Best Original Score || Randy Newman ||
|-
| Dallas–Fort Worth Film Critics Association || Best Animated Film || ||
|-
| Satellite Awards || Best Motion Picture, Animated or Mixed Media || Tim Burton<br />Denise Di Novi ||
|-
| Saturn Awards || Best Fantasy Film || ||
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| rowspan="2"|Young Artist Awards || Best Family Feature – Animation or Special Effects || ||
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| Best Performance in a Voiceover – Young Artist ||Paul Terry ||
|}
Potential remake
In August 2016, Sam Mendes was revealed to be in negotiations with Disney to direct another live action adaptation of the novel, with Nick Hornby in talks for the script. In May 2017, however, Mendes was no longer attached to the project due to his entering talks with Disney about directing a live-action film adaptation of Pinocchio, which he would also drop out on with Robert Zemeckis taking his place.