Ainbo: Spirit of the Amazon

José Zelada and Richard Claus who has previously worked for movies such as The Little Vampire 3D collaborated as directors for the upcoming 3D Amazon adventure film. One of Peru's leading visual effects studio, Tunche Films will be the main animation production studio located in Miraflores to animate Peruvian feature film: Ainbo: Spirit of the Amazon. It will be the first major animated film from the animation house ever since its founding in 2003 by director José Zelada and brothers Sergio and César Zelada. Its sister company EPIC Cine-Peru will join production with Netherlands-based studio Cool Beans and Dutch animation house Katuni[4][5]

The original story is by José Zelada while the producers will be the Zelada brothers as wells as Richard Claus. Pierre Salazar from Peru is in charge of production design who has previously worked for such projects as The LEGO Movie, Sucker Punch, and Happy Feet. CMG (Cinema Management Group) an executive production Hollywood group from Beverly Hills agreed to produce and distribute the movie.[6][7] Luis Pages from Weta Workshop joined the animation studio that also features an international cast of animators from Peru to Netherlands.[8]

Principal photography began in 2017 as footage and posters of the film were released as early as March 31, 2017. The footage features the heroine Ainbo in the tropical rain forest of the Amazon meeting giant turtles and tapirs.[9] At the Ventana Sur (Argentina's audiovisual festival) ‘Animation!’ event in January 2017, one of Latin America's prestigious film festivals alongside Mexico's Pixelatl festival, CMG President Ed Noeltner met with the Zelada brothers and agreed to bring the movie to a global audience.[10] The animated pitch for the movie had potential as Ed Noeltner says, "Ainbo was the most commercial and attractive animation project we’d seen in a while. The themes and indigenous character designs have a universal appeal and we’re looking forward to a successful collaboration in making Ainbo a worldwide hit."

José Zelada says, work for the movie started since seven years before the eventful meeting at Ventana Sur: "Ainbo, we saved it about seven years ago and decided to go in November to Ventana Sur, which is a film market in Argentina, and we took the project, we dusted it...We managed to get enough reception, and we managed to place it, sell it to a Hollywood producer."[11]

César Zelada Mathews contributed to bringing in Richard Claus' Netherlands, Amsterdam-based animation studio Cool Beans to collaborate with Tunche Films as a co-production company.[12] Therefore, Ainbo became a joint venture between Peru and Netherlands. At a Paris meeting, Claus read the script, that became the starting point for an international collaboration project. The studios from Beverly Hills, Amsterdam, and Lima joined into one single unit. However, initially the venture was met by the constraints of the language barrier as well as staying focused on the ambitious cinematographic milestones despite the constrained budget. The challenges became a learning opportunity as the team from the Americas over time synchronized with their colleagues in Europe on task flows.[3] CMG also established new writers to the screenplay development including Brian and Jason Cleveland, Larry Wilson, and Richard Claus himself.[12][13]

The Zelada family has a deep-rooted history with the Amazon rain forest. The Zelada brothers are acquainted living in a small village similar to the story line of Ainbo the main character of the film. They and their family lived close to the Ucayali River at Pucallpa in the Amazon Basin during the 1980s.[14] Their childhood spent listening to the local stories have greatly influenced the direction for the film Ainbo. The character Ainbo herself is inspired by the stories their mother told them while they were boys living in the Amazon rain forest.[3]

The stories they heard are also demonstrative of the ancestral tales of the Amazon that have been told for thousands of years. They bare a distinct natural cosmology where talking animals coexist with humans in a symbiotic relationship.[3] As a result, the directors will channel their memory about the childhood Amazon tales they have heard to the cinema medium.[15] On September 24. 2020, CMG exclusively shared the first launch of the teaser trailer to Animation Magazine that aired via Vimeo.[16]

CMG presented the film at the 2017 67th Berlin International Film Festival during February 9, 2017.[17][18] At the 2018 AFM, CMG managed to appraise the movie to potential buyers.[19] In Dec 20, 2017, Tunche Films held a preview at the Imagina Film Festival of Animation in Peru hosted by the Telefónica Foundation.[20] Ainbo was presented at the 2018 Animation! of Ventana Sur in Buenos Aires.[10] By 2019, Ainbo has managed to be signed in distribution agreements in over 108 countries.[21]

The final coverage of the sales include 23 distributors that represents over half of the world's major markets. In Berlin in 2017, sales included a TV distribution with Fox and multi-territory deals with Vietnam, Laos, Thailand (Blue Lantern), the Baltics (Best Film/Asphire) and the Middle East (Front Row). At the AFM, rights were sold to Italy (BIM Distribuzione), eOne/WW Entertainment for Benelux, Singapore's Shaw Ent, and Poland's Kino Świat. Current new distributors include China (Turbo Films), Germany (Telepool), Latin America (CDC Intl.), Commonwealth of Independent States (Volga), South Korea (First Run), Scandinavia (Cinemanse), France (Le Pacte), and Israel (Film House). Ainbo: Spirit of the Amazon is CMG's best, pre-selling animated feature since 2005 Hoodwinked – The True Story of Little Red Riding Hood.[12]

Despite the challenges faced by the logistical issues caused by COVID-19, CMG is on schedule to release the film, slated as Peru's most ambitious animation film to theaters in 2021.[16] Ainbo will release in different quarters of the year 2021. In the European school holidays of February, the film will debut in April 22 coinciding with Earth Day. The release date is intended to raise awareness of the precious ecosystem of the Amazon rainforest.[16]

At the 41th AFM online edition, on November 9, 2020, Ainbo: Spirit of the Amazon was presented.[3] Cartoon Brew picked the film in one of their list of anticipated animated releases exhibited at the AFM.[22]

Filmarti of Turkey will present the movie on January 22, 2021.[23] In Netherlands, the movie will be released on February 10, 2021. In anticipation for the release a Dutch trailer was released on November 23, 2021.[24] Furthermore, Storyworld, the Dutch museum for comics and animation at Groningen will host a 3D production exhibition of the film from January 30, 2021.[25] Cinenews from Belgium put the movie in the most anticipated upcoming movies list in 2021 for children.[26]

The script is intended as a family-friendly animated feature film that will describe the Peruvian legends and stories to a global audience.[27] The script explores the life of Ainbo an Amazonian girl who lives in an uncharted tropical paradise of the Amazon called Candámo.[15] The name Ainbo is based on a local Peruvian dialect for "little girl."[28] The characters of the film are derived from the Shipibo-Conibo tribe of the Ucayali River. The script will explore the ramifications of what deforestation and extinction can have on a rain forest civilization that previously never knew of other people than their own.[15]

Peruvian Amazonia, traditional indigenous cultures, and mythological storytelling are highlighted.[29] Universal elements aren't forgotten as key highlights include the negative effects of deforestation and illegal mining as Ainbo is destined to defend Candámo from loggers and greed reinforcing the themes of ecology and diversity.[30] The writers represented the negative effects as a motif for the Amazon myth antagonist character known as the Yacuruna.[15]

The film will be supplemented by local legends. Variety says, "Ainbo: Spirit of the Amazon will incorporate local legends, in an explosion of colors, eco-themes and mythological characters."[10] The directors remarked the movie has all the standards of a typical Hollywood animation studio movie and one of the reasons why the movie found appeal to the distributor's was the Amazon rain forest's natural heritage status.[16][15]

The script will also examine the legends of the animal spirits that civilizations and Native American groups of the Americas throughout history have described as a sort of guardian in their upbringing. Animal spirits described in the film include the skinny armadillo Dillo and the heavy-set tapir Vaca.[31] They are introduced as comic-relief characters.[3] One of the major spirit animals highlighted is the benevolent Mother spirit of the Amazon: Turtle Motelo Mama described in lore as a giant turtle that protects the Amazon biosphere by carrying the whole ecosystem above the carapace.[3]

At EPIC Cine-Peru studio it was revealed that the animators employ various technologies such as 3D animation, digital sculpture, motion capture, and VFX.[32] Sergio Zelada was the director of animation and visual effects. Students from Tunche Films founded Epic Film School were part of the animation crew.[15] At Katuni Animation studio, the technical director was Bram Vermaas. Using a suite of animation tools from Autodesk Maya such as Shotgun, animBot, and whisKEY, the animation studio was able to review and increase efficiency for the animation. Panel drawings for the characters, creatures, and background were handled by Tunche Films, while Katuni Animation handled the animation aspect for the film.[3]