Portland, Ore.-based Animation studio LAIKA informs us that its Moongirl collector’s edition book and DVD set completely sold out of its initial printing within the first two weeks of release. Featuring a picture book and the award-winning animated short film directed by Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach), all 40,000 units of the Moongirl release were snatched up by shoppers, necessitating a second printing.
The Moongirl book is illustrated by Peter Chan and Courtney Booker, who also helped animate the film. The release is distributed by Candlewick Press, publisher of such children’s favorites as The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, the Maisy books, the best-selling Judy Moody series and the Where’s Waldo books.
The animated Moongirl short was made as a frontrunner to LAIKA’s feature film efforts, which include Selick’s forthcoming stop-motion adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s fantasy children’s book Coraline. In pre-production is Jack & Ben’s Animated Adventure, a CG-animated family film which tells a story of survival, brotherly love and grand adventure set in the animal kingdom. That film is written and directed by Jorgen Klubien, a veteran storyboard artist and designer whose credits include The Nightmare Before Christmas, The Lion King, Toy Story 2, A Bug’s Life, and Monsters, Inc. Owned by Nike co-founder and chairman Phil Knight, the company recently purchased the rights to one of the U.K.’s current best-selling children’s novels, writer/illustrator Alan Snow’s Here Be Monsters.
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