Toy Story

Crews of hundreds can typically spend years making a single animated feature — and it's not uncommon during what "Kung Fu Panda 2" director Jennifer Yuh Nelson describes as a "messy, creative process" for a director to be fired midway through a production. It happened to Jan Pinkava, who was directing 2007's "Ratatouille" before Brad Bird took over the Oscar-winning Pixar film. And it happened to Chris Sanders ("How to Train Your Dragon"), who was removed from Disney's "American Dog" in 2006, before it was reimagined as "Bolt.

Disneyland Paris will celebrate its 20th anniversary with a new nighttime spectacular in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle and a revamped evening parade starting in April. The Disney Dreams show will feature castle projections, water screens, dancing fountains, pyrotechnic displays and laser effects that combine elements from the Magic, Memories, and You show at Florida's Magic Kingdom and World of Color at Disney California Adventure. PHOTOS: Disney Dreams water show at Disneyland Paris The new Disney Dreams nighttime spectacular at the French theme park will employ 30-foot-tall water screens in the moats in front of the castle that will serve as giant canvases for Disney animated scenes set to an original musical score.

'Disney on Ice: Toy Story 3' Where: Citizens Business Bank Arena, 4000 Ontario Center Parkway, Ontario When: Through Jan. 1; see website for showtimes Price: $16, $21, $26, $45 and $70 Info: (800) 745-3000, http://www.disneyonice.com

'Disney on Ice: Toy Story 3' Where: Citizens Business Bank Arena, 4000 Ontario Center Parkway, Ontario When: Through Jan. 1; see website for showtimes Price: $16, $21, $26, $45 and $70 Info: (800) 745-3000, http://www.disneyonice.com

Russians love Shrek. And Russians love the acorn-obsessed squirrel Scrat from "Ice Age." But Russians aren't showing a lot of love for Buzz and Woody. "Toy Story 3," released June 18, has been a blockbuster success in the U.S. and most of the other countries where it has opened, racking up $244 million in ticket sales domestically and more than $100 million in foreign nations, including more than $34 million in Mexico. But the Pixar Animation Studios sequel has posted surprisingly frigid box-office results in Russia, one of the hottest international markets for movies, especially for animated films.

Cartoonists have been toying with cut-rate Chinese imports for several weeks now. And once we got the cheap shots out of our system -- unfortunate fortune-cookie gags; Chuckie dolls: leaded or unleaded?; North Pole polemics about foreign elves -- we distributed some high-quality intellectual property into the global marketplace of ideas. Rob Rogers' big point about outsourcing has legs. Signe Wilkinson led us another direction, with small arms.

Proving that family entertainment from trusted brands has become more powerful at the box office than A-list stars, Pixar's "Toy Story 3" did nearly as much business on its second weekend in theaters as new movies starring Adam Sandler and Tom Cruise did combined. "Toy Story 3" sold a studio-estimated $59-million worth of tickets in the U.S. and Canada, making it No. 1 against a solid $41-million opening for "Grown Ups," an ensemble comedy starring Sandler, Chris Rock and Kevin James, and a tepid $20.5-million first weekend for the Cruise-Cameron Diaz action-comedy "Knight & Day."

When Pixar Animation Studios guru John Lasseter was working on the original "Toy Story" movie, he approached the maker of Barbie to include the fashion doll in the film -- and was rebuffed. What a difference 15 years, and $8 billion in global merchandise sales, make. As Disney's Pixar prepares to release "Toy Story 3" this summer, virtually every major toy maker -- including Barbie's Mattel Inc. -- has lined up to make dolls, action figures, construction sets, vehicles and board games based on the film.

"Toy Story 3" will rule the box-office playground again this weekend as the ensemble comedy "Grown Ups" is set for a healthy start and the Tom Cruise action comedy "Knight and Day" is already sputtering. "Knight," which stars Cruise as a spy and Cameron Diaz as a woman caught up in one of his missions, opened Wednesday to a weak $3.8 million. Distributor 20th Century Fox moved up the film's debut two days ahead of its planned Friday release and also had put on sneak previews Saturday in hopes of building word of mouth for the movie.

The soft summer box office is poised to get a big boost from "Toy Story 3" this weekend. People who have seen pre-release surveys say that "Toy Story 3" is certain to have the biggest opening for a movie from Pixar Animation Studios, beating 2004's "The Incredibles," which started with $70.4 million in the U.S. and Canada. Thanks to strong interest among all audience segments, as well as 3-D premium ticket prices, the movie could provide Pixar's first $100-million-plus opening if pre-release tracking is on target.

The $1.5 billion Paramount Park in Spain hopes to rival Disneyland Paris as a European tourist destination when the movie theme park debuts in spring 2015. > Photos: Paramount Park Murcia theme park in Spain Located on the Mediterranean coast about 270 miles southeast of Madrid, Paramount Park Murcia will feature 30 attractions with an adjacent shopping center, hotels and casino. Construction is expected to begin in spring 2012 on a 100-acre theme park set around a central lake that will combine the themed lands of Disneyland with the movie backlots of Universal Studios . While not an investor, Paramount Pictures will license movie properties to the developer and provide design direction for the theme park.

Entering the campus of the largest animation production facility in China, visitors are greeted by life-size statues of Disney and Pixar characters: Belle dancing with the Beast, Mowgli and Baloo sitting on a tree trunk and Buzz and Woody in a classic buddy pose. But this isn't an overseas outpost of the American studios. Instead, these knockoff statues are meant to inspire a new generation of Chinese animators to make films that can compete with Hollywood blockbusters and classics such as "Beauty and the Beast," "The Jungle Book" and "Toy Story.

Walt Disney famously said, "I only hope that we never lose sight of one thing — that it was all started by a mouse. " For the Pixar artists, it was all started by a lamp. Twenty-five years ago (Aug. 17, 1986), "Luxo, Jr.," a short depicting the misadventures of a rambunctious little desk lamp and his weary father, premiered in Dallas and did something no computer-animated film had done before: It made audiences laugh. The first film from Steve Jobs' newly formed company Pixar and the second from director John Lasseter, "Luxo" launched the most successful and innovative animation studio since Walt Disney's heyday in the 1930s.

Pixar, arguably Hollywood's most admired movie studio, has made its first lemon as far as the critics are concerned. "Cars 2," director John Lasseter's sequel to his 2006 ode to gearheads, has collected the worst reviews of any of the 12 films in the animation studio's 25-year-history. "It actually hurts to knock one of [Pixar's] movies — something I've never done before," wrote Indiewire critic Leonard Maltin. "But then, I've never gotten a headache watching any of their previous films.

"Honnnnnk! Honnnnnk!" John Lasseter had explicit instructions about how the Galloping Goose, an antique steam train character in "Cars 2," should look and sound, and he was delivering them with brio. It was January and the animation czar was making the hourlong commute from his home in Sonoma County to his Pixar office here on the outskirts of Oakland in the passenger seat of a town car. On his lap, he balanced an iPad loaded with shots to review while he recorded voice memos for the movie's crew: "Like a diesel horn.

"Honnnnnk! Honnnnnk!" John Lasseter had explicit instructions about how the Galloping Goose, an antique steam train character in "Cars 2," should look and sound, and he was delivering them with brio. It was January and the animation czar was making the hourlong commute from his home in Sonoma County to his Pixar office here on the outskirts of Oakland in the passenger seat of a town car. On his lap, he balanced an iPad loaded with shots to review while he recorded voice memos for the movie's crew: "Like a diesel horn.

Pixar Animation Studios, the pioneering digital studio that long prided itself on creating novel stories and characters, is now treading a well-worn Hollywood path. Three of the company's next four releases are sequels. On Friday, Pixar debuts the highly-anticipated third chapter of its popular "Toy Story" saga, to be followed in the next two years by new installments of "Cars" and "Monsters, Inc." Pixar won't have another original movie until 2012, when "Brave," about a young Scottish girl of royal blood who dreams of becoming a champion archer, arrives in theaters.

Crews of hundreds can typically spend years making a single animated feature — and it's not uncommon during what "Kung Fu Panda 2" director Jennifer Yuh Nelson describes as a "messy, creative process" for a director to be fired midway through a production. It happened to Jan Pinkava, who was directing 2007's "Ratatouille" before Brad Bird took over the Oscar-winning Pixar film. And it happened to Chris Sanders ("How to Train Your Dragon"), who was removed from Disney's "American Dog" in 2006, before it was reimagined as "Bolt.