Dream On Silly Dreamer

As the film’s new producer, West now found himself with the task of building a quasi-production house with his fellow Disney animators. “Imagine,” says West, “waking up one day only to find your car has been taken away. In its place is a giant box with all the pieces to make a car but no directions or tools to help you put these pieces together. … Now imagine having to build that car from scratch every single day, and that’s kind of what we were faced with.” With the Orlando studio imminently closing its doors and scattering its employees, time was also a factor. “It was a ticking timebomb,” says Lund, “to finish production in those few months at Disney before everyone had to leave.”

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In March 2004, the Orlando studio finally shut down. Lund returned to California to complete the film while West traveled back and forth between coasts to supervise post-production. It was an emotional challenge for Lund to spend all his time watching and re-watching the footage of his friends in the days of the layoffs. “While everyone else was moving forward with their life, I spent two years wallowing in a depressed place.”

The film finally reached completion by the end of the year, and in January 2005 it premiered at the Animex festival in England to rave reviews. “Animex was the beginning of our film’s life and it was a perfect sendoff for the festivals that followed,” says West. Its US premiere in Minneapolis, sponsored by the Independent Film Project, was screened down the street from the Disney shareholder’s convention and played on rotation all day to one full house after another. Recently, the film received a Certificate of Merit at the Annie Awards, solidifying the filmmakers’ support from their animation peers.

Today, Lund and West are still animating on their respective coasts, taking pride in the effect their film has made on the public. “Neither of us thought of it as something we were going to make money on,” says Lund, who is looking forward to breaking even with DVD sales. “Our rewards have been the crowds that show up to the movie. We’ve never not sold out a screening. Hopefully the DVD can reach even more people who missed it the first time.”

Visit him the official website of the film at www.DreamOnSillyDreamer.com.