Tom &amp; Jerry (2021 film)Tom &amp; Jerry (2021 film) Tom & Jerry (2021 film) Tom & Jerry (marketed as Tom & Jerry: The Movie) is a 2021 American live-action/computer-animated slapstick comedy film based on the titular cartoon characters of the same name created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, produced by the Warner Animation Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. It is the second theatrical film based on the characters, following "" (1992), and the third to animate them in the real world, following "Anchors Aweigh" (1945) and "Dangerous When Wet" (1953). The film's story follows Tom enlisted to catch Jerry, before his presence ruins New York City 's fanciest hotel and its planned wedding. The film is directed by Tim Story and written by Kevin Costello. It stars Chloë Grace Moretz, Michael Peña, Colin Jost, Rob Delaney, Pallavi Sharda, Jordan Bolger, Patsy Ferran, and Ken Jeong in live-action roles, with Nicky Jam, Bobby Cannavale, and Lil Rel Howery in voice roles. The titular characters are voiced by William Hanna via archival recordings, with additional vocals from Kaiji Tang and André Sogliuzzo (though the characters are listed as themselves in the credits). The film languished in development hell, due to the studio spending years to search for  a writer to pen the most faithful take on the characters for a feature film. Starting with a live-action film in 2009, to an animated film in 2015, and have then shifted to the Warner Animation Group producing a hybrid film blending classic animation style and live-action in 2018, with filming beginning in 2019. "Tom & Jerry" was theatrically released by Warner Bros. Pictures in the United States on February 26, 2021, along with a one-month simultaneous streaming release on HBO Max. The film was a box-office success, grossing $133.3 million against a $79 million  production budget. It received generally negative reviews from critics, who criticized the human characters and screenplay, but praised its animation and sense of nostalgia. Plot. In Manhattan, Tom Cat, who dreams of becoming a pianist, plays in Central Park. While his longtime rival, Jerry Mouse, is in search of a new home. After Tom's keyboard is destroyed in a fight, he chases Jerry, but bumps into a young woman named Kayla Forester, causing her to lose her job. Down on her luck, Kayla wants to prove her talents and looks for a position at New York's fanciest hotel , the Royal Gate, where Jerry moves in. Kayla is hired to help set up a high-profile wedding, by presenting a stolen resume as her own, and gets a tour of the hotel, while Jerry's usual shenanigans involve stealing food and items to ramp up his new lifestyle, and Tom plans various strategies to enter the hotel and pursue Jerry. Local celebrities Preeta Mehta and her fiancé Ben are greeted, as they arrive, along with their pets Spike and Toots. Who are all, except for Spike, unaware of Jerry stealing from Preeta's handbag. As the couple and their  pets are escorted to their room, Jerry's presence is revealed, which puts the wedding and the hotel at risk. Kayla offers to catch Jerry, but fails and realizes that he'll be hard to catch. After many failed attempts, Tom successfully enters the hotel, and his ensuing chase after Jerry wrecks the whole hotel room. Due to noise complaints, Kayla comes to check, but she befriends Tom, due to their shared goal of catching Jerry. Tom is hired by owner Mr. Dubros to exterminate Jerry, while Tom and Kayla's boss Terence threatens to fire them, if Tom fails  to catch Jerry. After many failed attempts, Tom designs an elaborate mouse trap and gets Jerry out of the hotel. Meanwhile, Kayla helps with the wedding plans and learns from Preeta that her engagement ring is missing. Jerry returns and reveals to Kayla that he had Preeta's ring, and he agrees to give it back to her, if she lets him stay in the hotel. Before Kayla can agree, Terence returns from walking Spike, and notices Tom looking for Jerry hiding in Kayla's coat pocket, but creates a huge scene that causes Spike, Tom, and Jerry's ensuing  chase to destroy the hotel's lobby. Terence is put on leave, while Kayla is promoted as event manager, for returning the ring stolen by Jerry. Kayla tells Tom and Jerry that they will have to get along and spend the next day far away from the hotel together, if they want to stay in the hotel, to which they agree. While Kayla takes care of the hotel and manages the wedding with the crew, Tom and Jerry bond during their trip, but are imprisoned at a pound, after inadvertently disrupting a baseball game. A vengeful Terence separately visits Tom  and Jerry, and feeds them lies of what they said to each other behind their backs, which angers them and incites them to fight at the ceremony, causing the wedding and the rest of the hotel to be destroyed. After Kayla comes clean and leaves in shame, while Preeta renounces the wedding, a remorseful Tom and Jerry reconcile with each other and put their differences aside to fix everything up. They convince Kayla and the hotel crew, including a reluctant Terence, to salvage the wedding, while the pair lure Preeta and Toots to Central Park, where the wedding is held  at. Kayla promises to Preeta that Tom and Jerry have changed their ways, and Ben apologizes to Preeta for his extensive expenses, in light of impressing her dad. Kayla and the stolen resume's owner reconcile with each other and get jobs at the hotel, while Tom strives to be a pianist and plays the piano for Toots, with Jerry joining the party, until a mishap causes them to revert to their old habits. Production. Development. Plans for a "Tom and Jerry" film were announced in 2009, as a live-action/CGI hybrid film, following the success of "Alvin and  the Chipmunks". It would’ve followed Tom and Jerry's origins over a Chicago backdrop, and would’ve been produced by Dan Lin, from a script written by Eric Gravning. On April 6, 2015, plans shifted from a live-action film to an animated film, with a script written by Bryan Schulz and Cornelius Uliano. It would've followed a young family moving into a New England country house inhabited by Jerry, causing them to quickly adopt a stray cat named Tom to get rid of him, until the duo decide to learn about friendship and protect the family. In  October 2018, Tim Story was hired to direct a "Tom and Jerry" film that would blend classic animation and live-action, inspired by the same technique used in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", which would begin filming in 2019, with a script written by Kevin Costello that was purely influenced from the original cartoons. It was reported that Story immediately mentioned his "admiration for the characters and how he'd love tackling that property.", when he was in discussions with Warner Bros. executives about what he was interested in directing. Claiming that it was his dream project to direct a "Tom  and Jerry" film. Director Tim Story, producer Chris DeFaria, and writer Kevin Costello were all committed to make the film stay in the same vein as the original theatrical shorts and honor the characters that they also agreed to use the classic "Tom and Jerry" cartoons as reference material to develop the film, which the studio allowed them to gain access to. In addition to the original "Tom and Jerry" theatrical shorts and "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", the film also took inspiration from silent cinema. During production, Story also ran through many of the classic shorts from memory and also  went back to read about the iconism behind the titular duo, while hoping the film will appeal to both longtime fans and a new generation of audiences. Casting. In March 2019, it was reported that Zoey Deutch and Olivia Cooke were frontrunners for the lead live-action role of Kayla, "who teams up with Tom to stop the pesky Jerry from ruining an important event for herself." Additionally, Sofia Carson, Elle Fanning, Jennifer Lawrence, Ariel Winter, Naomi Scott, Meg Donnelly, Hailee Steinfeld, Yara Shahidi, Kelly Marie Tran, Becky G and Isabela Moner were all in consideration for the role. Later  that month, it was reported that Peter Dinklage was being considered for the role of Terrance, Kayla's boss and the human antagonist of the film. In April, Chloë Grace Moretz was in final negotiations to star in the film. Moretz described Kayla as "a lot like Jerry" and as "a girl who gunned for what she wanted to achieve but realizes that time and honesty is what will prevail in the end", as well as "a total goofball", the latter aspect which allowed Moretz to "lean into who [she is] in real life". She also said Kayla is "a  little unlikeable with some of the decisions she makes", yet she still wanted the character to feel likeable. Moretz was inspired in her performance by Bob Hoskins' performance as Eddie Valiant in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", as well as by actresses Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Aniston, Lucille Ball, and Meg Ryan. Moretz, an avid fan of the source material, also says the film harkens back to the Tom and Jerry we love. In May 2019, Michael Peña joined the cast in the role Dinklage was eyed for. Colin Jost, Ken Jeong, Rob Delaney, Jordan Bolger and Pallavi Sharda were added to  the cast in July. Patsy Ferran was revealed to be part of the cast in September 2019. Besides Moretz, Peña, Jost, Jeong, Delaney, Bolger, Sharda and Ferran have also all grown up with Tom & Jerry and were thrilled to take their roles. In November 2020, Nicky Jam and Lil Rel Howery revealed that they have been cast in the film in voice roles. On December 2, 2020, Jam revealed that he will be the voice of Butch Cat in the film. Filming. Principal photography began in July 2019 at Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden in Hertfordshire, England. The film was shot  by cinematographer Alan Stewart, on the Sony VENICE cinema cameras and Panavision Primo 70 and Primo Artiste Lenses. Animators were present during filming, allowing cast members to improvise while figures of the titular characters were handled by puppeteers. Filming ended before the industry's temporary shutdown in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Animation. Animation services were provided by Framestore, who hired 3D animators with a passion for 2D animation for the project. The strategy the animators used was to base the animation off a stylized 3D/CGI VFX modeling medium through a vintage 2D finish by creating innovative rigging, animation  techniques used to create 2D animation, and custom tools such as lighting and rendering, resulting in the film's 3D/CGI animation maintaining the look, feel, and spirit of 2D animation, in the vein of the original classic shorts in the 1940s and 1950s, to pay even greater homage to what the cartoons have always been. The animators also used early "Tom and Jerry" shorts from the '40s and '50s as reference and inspiration for the animation sequences. Work on the animation was done remotely during the pandemic, with the filmmakers doing creative exploration on certain shots, and finalizing material  through production groups. Numerous animators who worked on films like "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" and "Space Jam" have also been involved with the animation of the movie. Director Tim Story passionately coined the term "2D+ animation", for the technique of stylizing 3D animation to embrace the look and feel of 2D animation. Music. On July 22, 2020, it was announced that Tim Story's recurring collaborator and composer Christopher Lennertz was set to compose the score of the film. The album was released by WaterTower Music on February 12, having 30 tracks. For the film's music, Lennertz and the  crew also looked back to the music of the original cartoons as inspiration. Release. Theatrical and streaming. "Tom & Jerry" was released in the United States on February 26, 2021, by Warner Bros. Pictures, in theaters and for a month streaming on HBO Max. The movie coincidentally released on Tex Avery's birthdate, in which the movie stars for a brief second one of Avery's characters, Droopy, in an animal shelter and on a "Joker" parody billboard. It is the first film to officially debut the new Warner Animation Group logo to match with the new shield that Warner Bros.  debuted in November 2019. It was originally scheduled to be released on April 16, 2021, but was pushed up to December 23, 2020. The film was then pushed back to March 5, 2021, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, before moving up a week in order to avoid competition with Disney's "Raya and the Last Dragon". Samba TV estimated that 1.2 million U.S. households streamed the film over its opening weekend on HBO Max. By the end of its first month, the film was watched in over 2.6 million U.S. households. On March 8, 2021, some HBO Max viewers who  attempted to watch the film were accidentally shown "Zack Snyder's Justice League", a movie which was supposed to release 10 days later. HBO Max quickly fixed the issue within two hours. Marketing. A float of the characters appeared in the 94th Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade to promote the film. On September 1, 2020, it was announced that Australian and Danish toy company Moose Toys and The Lego Group made a deal with Warner Bros. to make merchandise for the film. On February 20, 2021, Warner Bros. released two new shorts onto HBO Max titled "Tom and Jerry Special  Shorts" to honor the 81st anniversary of Tom and Jerry, as well as to promote the film. These shorts share the same animation style and come from the same crew of HBO Max's new "Looney Tunes Cartoons", also produced by Warner Bros. Animation.. The shorts were removed a month later for unknown reasons, but were brought back on July 8, 2021. The film's screenwriter, Kevin Costello, has also seen the shorts and acclaimed them. On March 6, 2021, Rob Delaney had been the star guest Announcer for "Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway", whereas the titular characters made  an appearance themselves with Sir Tom Jones. Home media. The film was available for rent on April 16, while Warner Bros. Home Entertainment released it on DVD, Blu-ray, and digital on May 18, 2021. The film was re-added to HBO Max on July 15, 2021. Reception. Box office. "Tom & Jerry" grossed $46 million in the United States and Canada, and $86.8 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $132.8 million. In the United States and Canada, the film grossed $4 million from 2,479 theaters on its first day of release. It went  on to debut to $14.1 million, the second-best opening weekend of the pandemic behind Warner Bros.'s December release "Wonder Woman 1984" ($16.7 million). The opening weekend audiences were 51% female and 46% under the age of 17, while 35% was Hispanic, 33% Caucasian, 21% African American, and 11% Asian. David Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research, said of the figure: "With half of theaters still closed, the pandemic still a threat, and "Tom & Jerry" available at home, this is a very good opening." In its second weekend the film grossed $6.6  million and in its third made $4 million, finishing second behind newcomer "Raya and the Last Dragon" both times. The film was initially released in seven international markets, grossing $1.45 million; Singapore led with $457,000. By its second weekend of international release the film was playing in 16 markets, including debuting at number one in Brazil ($746,000) and Mexico ($395,000). Critical response. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The site's critics consensus reads, "It isn't the worst of the long-squabbling  duo's feature-length adventures, but "Tom & Jerry" is disappointingly short on the anarchic spirit of their classic shorts." On Metacritic, the film a has weighted average score of 32 out of 100 based on 20 critics, the film received "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale, while PostTrak reported 79% of audience members gave it a positive score, with 60% saying they would definitely recommend it. "The Hollywood Reporter"s John DeFore said that audiences should just "rewatch "Roger Rabbit" instead" and wrote: "Tim Story's  Tom & Jerry is five to ten minutes of action that might have worked in one of the cartoon duo's shorts, surrounded by an inordinate amount of unimaginative, unfunny human-based conflict." Kevin Maher of "The Times" gave the film a score of 1 out of 5 stars, writing: "nothing will prepare you for the tone-deaf nature of this live-action abomination that inserts our cartoon protagonists, "Who Framed Roger Rabbit"-style, into a crass Manhattan misadventure about a celebrity wedding gone awry." Benjamin Lee of "The Guardian" gave the film a score of 2 out of 5 stars, writing : "While there’s little to truly loathe in "Fantastic Four" and "Ride Along" director Tim Story’s frantic new take on Tom & Jerry, there’s also an equal lack of anything to truly love; this is a serviceable, if entirely forgettable attempt to relaunch an old property for a new audience." Clarisse Loughrey of "The Independent" gave the film a score of 1 out of 5 stars, describing it as "the cinematic equivalent of a sausage casing stuffed with mystery meat", though she praised Moretz's performance. Matt Fowler of "IGN" gave the film a score of 6/10, and wrote : ""Tom & Jerry" is a sufficient family offering with a cool cast, a sparkling soundtrack, and occasional fun. It's too bad that Tom and Jerry often feel like afterthoughts in their own film and that there wasn't much more for them to do other than serve the story of others." Charlotte O'Sullivan of the "Evening Standard" gave the film a score of 3 out of 5 stars, writing: "Ignore catty reviews that present this caper as soulless. Though horribly flawed, its internal organs are in the right place." A staff of The Banner named Brooke Price, who also mentions  the film's production as reference, was positive on the film, praising its nostalgic feel, its blend of classic animation and live-action, and its faithfulness to the source material. Peter Debruge of "Variety" was also positive on the film and said: "Truth be told, the movie’s a pretty faithful extension of the frenemies’ long-running feud — basically, the two cannot peacefully coexist under the same roof — and as such, we should be grateful to director Tim Story (“Shaft”) and screenwriter Kevin Costello (“Brigsby Bear”) for not dropping a two-ton anvil on our nostalgia, the way so  many big-studio toonsploitation projects have in recent years." Animated spin-off. "Tom and Jerry in New York" is an HBO Max original animated series produced by Warner Bros. Animation (outsourced by Renegade Animation, the team behind the 2014 Cartoon Network TV series "The Tom and Jerry Show") that is a follow-up to the film, which follows Tom and Jerry as new residents of the Royal Gate Hotel, with their usual antics and mayhem to follow them all over the hotel and beyond, going across Manhattan, New York City. It was released on July 1, 2021. Tom & Jerry (2021