SAN DIEGO, California (Reuters) — After holding a similar launch at this year’s Cannes film festival, Anna Kendrick and Justin Timberlake took to another festival – Comic-Con – to show off footage from the upcoming film “Trolls.”
The film is based on the popular Danish toys and sees Poppy (Kendrick) and Branch (Timberlake) go on a quest to save their fellow trolls from the Bergens.
Animated films are standard work for Hollywood stars but Kendrick admitted it wasn’t hard work. “First of all I do nothing in this movie,” she said on the press line following their panel. “There’s so many artists and craftsmen and geniuses working on what you see in the finished product and it’s so inspiring and impressive so I was just excited to get to come in and just say words. It’s all good for me.”
In the panel the producer Gina Shay spoke about how they have purposely given the characters curves so they could be good role models for young girls who worry about their body shapes.
It was a feeling echoed by Kendrick. She said “I mean, I remember I had a really complicated relationship with my Barbies and other dolls when I was growing up. I would like to put them on the lawn and burn them with magnifying glasses and stuff and go I’m confused as to how I feel about these toys but with Trolls, they’re nothing but love and cuteness. They’re like if little pug dogs were mythical creatures so it’s all good.”
Timberlake not only voices Branch but also provides the music for the film. “Getting to produce all the music for it and help steer the DNA of the film and the story itself was really really exciting for me. I felt like I got to know so much more about the movie in doing that and it helps steer it in the direction that everybody wanted it to go.”
The footage shown at the convention had a distinct Seventies feel. Co-director Mike Mitchell explained ‘The Seventies are like a fairy tale time. I mean, for kids they don’t remember the Seventies. A phone with a cord is like an otherwordly thing so we embraced it as a fairy tale we were telling and also people don’t remember the seventies for different reasons but the Seventies is almost like a magical time now.”
“Trolls” is expected to be released in November.
