Hotel Transylvania | |
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![]() Theatrical release poster
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Directed by | Genndy Tartakovsky[1] |
Produced by | Michelle Murdocca |
Screenplay by | Peter Baynham Robert Smigel[2] |
Story by | Todd Durham Daniel Hageman Kevin Hageman |
Starring | Adam Sandler Andy Samberg Selena Gomez Kevin James Fran Drescher Steve Buscemi Molly Shannon David Spade Cee Lo Green |
Music by | Mark Mothersbaugh[3] |
Editing by | Catherine Apple |
Studio | Sony Pictures Animation |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release dates |
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Running time | 91 minutes[4] |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $85 million[5] |
Box office | $291,455,525[5] |
Hotel Transylvania is a 2012 American 3D computer-animated comedy film produced by Sony Pictures Animation and distributed by Columbia Pictures. It was directed by Genndy Tartakovsky, the creator of Samurai Jack, Dexter's Laboratory, and Sym-Bionic Titan, and produced by Michelle Murdocca. The film features the voices of Adam Sandler, Andy Samberg, Selena Gomez, Kevin James, Fran Drescher, Steve Buscemi, Molly Shannon, David Spade and Cee Lo Green.[6]
The film tells a story of Dracula, the owner of Hotel Transylvania, where the world's monsters can take a rest from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters, including Frankenstein's monster, Mummy, a Werewolf family, and the Invisible Man, to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis. When the hotel is unexpectedly visited by an ordinary 21-year-old traveler named Jonathan, Dracula must protect Mavis from falling in love with him before it is too late.
Released on September 28, 2012, the film was met with mixed critical reception, while the general population received it very favorably. Despite mixed reviews, Hotel Transylvania set a new record for the highest-grossing September opening weekend, earning a total of $291 million on a budget of $85 million. A sequel, titled Hotel Transylvania 2, is scheduled to be released on September 25, 2015.[7]
Dracula (voiced by Adam Sandler) is the owner and creator of Hotel Transylvania, a five-star resort where the world's monsters can be safe from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters like Frankenstein (Kevin James) and his wife Eunice (Fran Drescher), Murray the Mummy (Cee Lo Green), Wayne and Wanda Werewolf (Steve Buscemi and Molly Shannon), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Bigfoot, Steve the Blob, and other monsters to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis (voiced by Selena Gomez). However, Mavis prefers to explore the outside world with her father's permission, but the village he directs her to is actually an elaborate deception to convince her of the threat of humans enough to coax her back.
However, this charade inadvertently attracts the attention of an ordinary young traveler named Jonathan (voiced by Andy Samberg) who was exploring the surrounding forest and followed the staff to the hotel. Once Jonathan enters the hotel, Dracula frantically attempts to hide him from the patrons such as disguising him as a Flesh Golem named Johnny-stein with the later hasty cover story of being a relative of one of Frank's body parts. Eventually, Jonathan is discovered by Mavis and company, forcing Dracula to claim he is going to arrange Mavis' birthday party with a young perspective. In doing so, Jonathan manages to charm everyone at the hotel, especially Mavis. Eventually, even Dracula begins to like the human taking him into his confidence about his family's traumatic past after the vampire notices the young man knows something about them in a respectful manner.
Unfortunately, Chef Quasimodo Wilson (Jon Lovitz) realizes Jonathan is human and captures him to cook him, forcing Dracula to directly intervene by magically paralyzing the chef. Eventually, the birthday party happens and it is a raucous success until Dracula freaks out when Mavis and Jonathan have an innocent kiss. A ranting Dracula accidentally lets it slip that he tricked Mavis at the fake village and Mavis is outraged at being manipulated by her own father. Things get worse when Chef Quasimodo breaks out of the spell and interrupts the party and reveals Jonathan's true nature. Even as the clientele are revolted, Mavis still accepts and expresses her desire to be with Jonathan even though he is human. For his part, Jonathan feels obliged to reject Mavis for her father's sake and leaves the hotel. Afterward, Dracula realizes that in his efforts to protect Mavis, he has broken her heart and now she tearfully wants to stay at the hotel forever.
Wishing to undo his mistake, Dracula persuades his friends to help him find Jonathan and even risks his destruction by venturing out in the daylight to do so. Learning that Jonathan is about to board a flight out of Transylvania Airport shortly, they race on and enter a town en route. At that town, Dracula and company are stunned to see the humans having a 'Monster Festival'. To clear a path, Frankenstein tries to scare them, but finds the humans are cheerfully welcoming them instead and even provide a shaded route through the town for Dracula to proceed at maximum speed.
However, Dracula finds that he is too late with Jonathan's plane taking off. With no alternative, Dracula desperately flies after it in broad daylight despite being hurt by the sun. With much effort, Dracula manages to reach the plane and resorts to mind-controlling one of the pilots (Brian Stack) to apologize and tell Jonathan that he wants him to return to be with his daughter. Jonathan accepts Dracula's apology and Dracula manipulates the plane back to the airport.
Later, Dracula returns Jonathan to Mavis, who tells her that she's his 'zing' and the reason why he had to reject her. Dracula gives his blessing to their relationship, Jonathan and Mavis kiss and the hotel has another party to celebrate his daughter's liberating coming of age before Jonathan and Mavis set off on their travels.
The film ends with Dracula and his friends being shown in traditional animation (in the style of Genndy Tartakovsky's cartoons) during the credits.
Hydra heads voiced by Paul Brittain, Craig Kellman, Tom Kenny, Brian McCann, Jonny Solomon, and Jim Wise.
Besides the principal monster characters, the following monsters appeared in this film:
Hotel Transylvania has been in development since 2006, when Anthony Stacchi and David Feiss were set to direct the film.[13] In 2008, Jill Culton took over the directing position,[14] and around 2010, Chris Jenkins,[15] with Todd Wilderman.[16] In 2011, Genndy Tartakovsky took over as the sixth director[17] to direct his feature directorial debut.[8][16]
In less than a year, Tartakovsky rewrote the script and reimagined the film to follow the energy, organic-ness and exaggeration of the 2D animation, particularly of the Tex Avery's cartoons.[18] "I took all the aesthetics I like from 2-D and applied them here," Tartakovsky said. "I don't want to do animation to mimic reality. I want to push reality."[17] "I wanted to have an imprint so you'd go, 'Well, only Genndy can make this.' It's hard, especially with CG, but I feel there's a lot of moments that feel that they're very me, so hopefully it'll feel different enough that it has a signature to it."[11]
In November 2011, it was announced that Miley Cyrus would voice Mavis, Dracula's teenage daughter,[6] but in February 2012, Cyrus left the film. It was later announced that Selena Gomez would replace Cyrus.[19]
Hotel Transylvania premiered on September 8, 2012, at the Toronto International Film Festival.[4] Distributed by Columbia Pictures, the film received a wide release on September 28, 2012.[2] Since October 26, 2012, the film's showings in Regal Entertainment Group Cinemas have been exclusively accompanied by a new traditionally animated short film, Goodnight Mr. Foot. Based on Hotel Transylvania, the short was directed and animated by Genndy Tartakovsky.[23]
The film's first international trailer was released on March 27, 2012.[24] The US domestic trailer debuted on April 24, 2012,[25] and was attached to The Pirates! Band of Misfits.[26] The second trailer debuted on June 21, 2012, and was seen on some prints of Brave.[27]
Hotel Transylvania will be released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D on January 29, 2013. It will be accompanied by the short animated film, Goodnight Mr. Foot.[28]
Hotel Transylvania has received mixed reviews from critics, praising the direction and animation, but criticizing its script. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 43% of critics gave the film positive reviews, with an average rating of 5.3/10 based on 132 reviews. The site's critical consensus reads: "Hotel Transylvania's buoyant, giddy tone may please children, but it might be a little too loud and thinly-scripted for older audiences."[29] Another review aggregate, Metacritic, calculated an average score of 47 out of 100, based on 32 reviews.[30] CinemaScore polls conducted during the opening weekend revealed that the average grade cinemagoers gave Hotel Transylvania was an A- on an A to F scale.[31]
The film has earned $143,555,525 in North America, as of November 29, 2012, and $147,900,000 in other countries, for a worldwide total of $291,455,525.[5] Officially reported budget for the film was $85 million,[5] although some reports claimed that the film actually cost $100 million.[32]
It topped the box office with $11 million on Friday, and $42.5 million domestically and $50.6 million worldwide for the weekend, breaking the record for the largest-grossing September opening ever, ahead of Sweet Home Alabama ($35.6 million).[32] It is also the highest-grossing debut for Sony Pictures Animation, beating The Smurfs' opening ($35.6 million).[33] According to the Sony's president of worldwide distribution Rory Bruer, Sony was very satisfied with the film's performance: "Hotel Transylvania is performing beyond anyone's imagination, and the holds are ridiculous. It exceeds expectations in every new market it opens in."[34]
A social game based on the film, titled Hotel Transylvania Social Game, and made by Sony Pictures Interactive, was released on August 15, 2012. The game allows players to create their own Hotel Transylvania, where they must take care over hotel guests.[35]
Another video game, titled Hotel Transylvania, developed by Way Forward and published by GameMill Entertainment, was released on September 18, 2012, for Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS at retail.[36][37] The game was also released in the Nintendo eShop in North America on November 15, 2012.[38]
A mobile game, titled Hotel Transylvania Dash, developed by Sony Pictures Consumer Products Inc. and PlayFirst, was released to iTunes App Store on September 20, 2012. The game is a variation of Hotel Dash mobile game and features the film's art and characters.[39]
A mobile digital storybook app, titled Hotel Transylvania BooClips Deluxe App, developed by Castle Builders and Sony Pictures Animation, was released to iTunes App Store, Nook Store, Google Play for the Android, iBookstore, Microsoft's Metro, and for the PC and Mac via www.BooClips.com, both in English and in Spanish, on September 20, 2012.[40]
Goodnight Mr. Foot is a traditionally animated short film based on Hotel Transylvania, featuring Bigfoot from the film. Premiering as a Halloween treat on October 26, 2012, the short is being shown exclusively before the theatrical shows of Hotel Transylvania in Regal Entertainment Group Cinemas. As Sony Pictures Animation's first traditionally animated film, it was written and directed by Genndy Tartakovsky, who also drew every key frame of the short. Animated in the style of Bob Clampett, Tex Avery, and Chuck Jones,[23] Tartakovsky created the short in four weeks during the final production stages of the main film.[41] Bigfoot (who has a non-speaking role in Hotel Transylvania) was voiced by Corey Burton.[42]
Taking place before the events in Hotel Transylvania, the short stars Bigfoot, whose rest in Hotel Transylvania is being constantly disturbed by an overly enthusiastic witch maid.[23]
Genndy Tartakovsky, the director of the film, commented in October 2012 the possibility of the sequel: "Everyone is talking about it, but we haven't started writing it. There are a lot of fun ideas we could totally play with. It's a ripe world."[42] On November 9, 2012, it was announced that a sequel has been greenlit, and is set for release on September 25, 2015. Tartakovsky will not return for the sequel, as he is already directing a 2014 adaptation of Popeye.[7]