Wallace and Gromit creator Nick Park reveals his first ever animated film | Daily Mail Online comments Loved by the nation, animated characters Wallace and Gromit have become household names. Their creator, Nick Park, has received endless accolades for his four animated short films following the duo's hilarious escapades. Here, he reveals the childhood influences that led to the birth of Wallace and Gromit and for the first time unveils his first ever animated film, Walter The Rat Goes Fishing. Scroll down to watch exclusive video of Nick Park's first ever animated film. It was the same routine every summer in the Sixties. As school broke up and the sun emerged, my family would depart our Lancashire home in an ancient Land Rover or beaten-up Ford van to go camping in North Wales. Our spirits were high, but the journey was far from smooth. Inevitably we would break down, leaving me and my four siblings sitting at the roadside as our father Roger wrestled with whichever recalcitrant engine component had failed us. For us, motor maintenance was as much part of a holiday as cloudy skies and ice-cream. Indeed, it was only in later life that we discovered most family getaways do not include compulsory vehicle repair.

The Rat That Goes Fishing: Nick Park's first animated film - shot by the Oscar-winner when he was just 13 - featured characters made from cotton bobbins Ambitious: Park shot the film on an 8mm movie camera his father bought for his mother on her birthday First attempt: As a teenager, Park was influenced by his father who he describes as a 'tinkerer, maker and mender' My father, an architectural photographer, was an incurable tinkerer, maker and mender. He was always building something in his shed. We never bought anything new – you didn’t in those days – and materials were easy to come by. Dad would drive to our local municipal dump outside Preston, ostensibly to dispose of our old junk. But he would return home with more than he’d taken – wheels, wood, miscellaneous mechanisms – my mother Celia frowning at his new haul, in a manner not dissimilar to Gromit. Family life, though, was always fun. On one occasion, Dad constructed a caravan from scratch, stripping down an old chassis and building a new body out of hardboard and timber.

It had furniture permanently fixed to the floor – a real home from home, even down to the wallpapered interior, applied lovingly by my mother. Creative: Park's parents loved making things. His father once built a caravan for their summer holidays while his mother made clothes Model maker: Nick Park with his creations Wallace and Gromit The Rocket: Famously debuted in World of Invention, it was designed to fetch cheese from the moon and also benefited from homely furniture and tasteful wallpaper. Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual Wallace and Gromit in a scene from A Grand Day out, the first of their four animated adventures For us, this was a splendid adventure, building our own transport and taking it on holiday. Years later, when I constructed the Rocket for A Grand Day Out – the first Wallace and Gromit film – I realised suddenly that I’d made a movie about my dad. Wallace’s rocket, designed to fetch cheese from the moon, also benefited from homely furniture and tasteful wallpaper.

It’s that spirit of British amateur inventiveness and do-it-yourself pluck that the Wallace and Gromit stories seek to recreate – the (probably mistaken) idea that everyday life can be improved by the wonders of modern science, preferably undertaken in a cellar or shed with a large dollop of Beano-style humour. A Grand Day Out only had the one invention – the rocket – but as Wallace rose to international stardom so his contraptions became more ambitious. His mind races to dream up ever more sophisticated labour-saving devices, operated by a button or lever. Of course, it’s only his own labour that is saved, usually at Gromit’s expense. The Easy Iron: Wallace pedals, thus turning a conveyor belt while Gromit wears a pair of irons to ensure crease-free clothing. Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual The real thing: Wallace and Gromit in action on the Easy Iron The silent dog ends up doing all the work – as happens with the Mark 1 Easy Iron, in which Gromit is required to skate with irons strapped to his paws while clothes move along a heat-resistant conveyor belt.

It’s perfect for trousers, shirts and even woollens, but would be tricky if the belt conks out. Spontaneous tank top combustion would surely ensue. With such demands placed on his canine shoulders, you cannot help but feel sorry for Gromit. Of the two, he is the cleverer, but is forever bewildered at the cruel hand life has dealt him – wondering why he goes along with Wallace’s latest preposterous scheme. Imprisoned in a dog’s body, obliged to be a dogsbody. If you’re a busy chap like Wallace you need to use your day productively – dressing and getting ready for breakfast are clearly a waste of time when there’s inventing afoot. That’s why he designs the Bed Launcher & Auto Dresser for The Wrong Trousers. The Bun Vacuum 6000: This is pest extraction device seen in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.

Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual Wallace and Gromit test their pest control contraption in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit When the contraption was revived for Curse Of The Were-Rabbit, Wallace could no longer slide through the trap door from bed to breakfast table – due to an expanding waistline brought about by overindulgence in Wensleydale. The solution is ingenious but simple – Gromit operates a large mallet to force him through. Wallace is convinced he can solve any problem with technology and scientific logic, but usually succeeds in making things worse. When he gets his tea from the dual-purpose Fuel & Drinks Dispenser, he actually confesses his folly, declaring: ‘A bit dieselly, perhaps.’ The convenient provision of food and drink is at the heart of many Wallace devices, such as the Labour Assisting Device (L.A.D.). This friendly mechanical butler may borrow from 1950s sci-fi robots but they were missing a trick: they didn’t make tea or serve cheese and crackers. The Bed Launcher: Gromit gets tipped out of bed by Wallace's wake-up machine, and falls through a trapdoor into the breakfast chair in The Wrong Trousers.

Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual Wallace in action in a scene from The Wrong Trousers Like my father, I would never as a child throw anything away, keeping old toys, electric motors and bits of broken machines under my bed in what I called my Box of Useful Things. I adapted a plastic bottle so that it would squeeze out different colours of wool. It was clearly a device the world had been crying for so I sent it to Blue Peter, the first of many failed attempts to win an appearance on the show. Junk was the stuff from which we made our hopes and dreams. My brother and I belonged to a small gang who constructed home-made go-carts from pram wheels and wood, just like the Beano’s Bash Street Kids. A nearby scrap yard that would give us bits of old bubble cars, those strange one or two-seater vehicles popular in the 1950s and 1960s. We used a front chassis from one to make our smartest model, hoping it would finally get us that appearance on Blue Peter. Sadly, it didn’t – that had to wait until I was an adult. The Pie Launcher: Designed to make dinner times a little easier.

Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual Pie-eyed: Wallace has fun feeding Gromit There were other madcap ideas. My brother and I planned a hovercraft using fans and an inflatable rubber ring, but it never got far beyond the drawing board. Perhaps that was in my mind when Wallace created the Hover Wellies, perfect for land, water, snow, ice and puddles. Hovercraft and go-carts were all well and good, but I hankered after adventure far beyond Preston and North Wales. I wanted to fashion my old motors and switches into machines which would spirit me to mysterious worlds as they did in HG Wells’s The Time Machine and the Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea. Disappointment never crossed my mind. It was not, however, a time machine or a submarine that finally transported my imagination but the Bell & Howell 8mm movie camera my dad bought my mum for her birthday. Despite it being hers, my parents encouraged all of us to make films. This was a revelation. I discovered the camera had a single frame button that enabled you to do stop motion. I created characters, initially using cotton bobbins from Mum’s dressmaking kit rather than modelling clay.

You shot a single frame of your character, then you moved it and shot the next frame to simulate movement. I was amazed: here I was, aged 13, in our loft making animated films just like my heroes. The Jumbo Generator: This contraption powered the studio by harnessing the flatulence of an elephant. Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual From Wallace and Gromit's World of Invention, the Jumbo Generator After studying in Sheffield, I went down to London to do my post-graduate degree at the National Film and Television School, embarking on the movie that would eventually become A Grand Day Out. I had little money as a student, so I spent my weekends pottering round the Science Museum. Some of those early cast iron steam engines, ancient cars and vintage labour-saving household appliances can be seen in Wallace’s constructions, especially my favourite, the Bun Vac 6000 from Curse Of The Were-Rabbit. As usual, the unwieldy pest control contraption is Wallace’s way of solving everything through technology. He doesn’t want to hurt the rabbits – instead deploying suction to capture them alive so they can be released without being harmed.

It’s part Victorian – with lots of rivets – and part Dyson. Equally, there are elements of early industrial technology in the Jumbo Generator, which Wallace brilliantly designs to power his cellar television studio. It uses a readily available commodity – Brussels sprouts – which are fed to an elephant, which produces methane, in turn firing an electric turbine. There is only one problem: elephants are not quite as plentiful as sprouts – the elephant in the room, you might say. And, Gromit has ended up doing all the work, yet again, feeding the elephant wheelbarrows of green veg. The Fuel and Drinks Dispenser: Refreshments such as tea can be served through the nozzle. Taken from Haynes Cracking Contraptions 2 Manual Another of Wallace’s problems is he cannot stop himself tinkering, like my dad. He always wants to modify existing technology such as the Austin 35 Van, also from Curse Of The Were-Rabbit. He fits access hatches, a lasso system, grabbers and a giant female rabbit puppet intended to lure the male were-rabbit and, as ever, operated by Gromit.

We chose the Austin A35 because it’s such an unlikely heroic car – our ironic take on the Bat mobile or the Starsky and Hutch car. That didn’t stop an American movie executive asking me during the early stages of making the film if Wallace could have a cooler, more modern car. The whole point is that it’s not cool. Wallace and Gromit’s contraptions are created purely for gags, but we all have the urge to invent – especially children. If they’re bored, kids will make something from cardboard boxes, yoghurt pots, tape and elastic bands. Often those constructions are the best. It was a childhood dream of mine to become an inventor, and I suppose I’ve been lucky enough to realise that ambition through Wallace, and the inventions that he comes up with. I have to admit to not being the greatest technician, but stop motion animation gives me licence to create machines that wouldn’t otherwise be possible – inventions that seem real and actually work. In animation everything and anything is possible, even elephant wind power.

Wallace & Gromit Cracking Contraptions 2 Derek Smith (with letter from Wallace), Illustrations Graham Bleathman RRP: £12.99 BUY IT HERE Welcome | Wallace and Gromit Welcome to the world of Wallace & Gromit, the home of everything to do with the eccentric inventor and his trusted canine friend. Revisit classic film moments and get to know a little more about Nick Park, creator of one of the best-loved duos in animation. Delve into a history filled with quirky stories and fascinating trivia, as well as following the recent news from the world of Aardman, sharing your own Wallace & Gromit creations, taking part in competitions and much more. "Won’t you come in? We were just about to have some cheese…" Interview: Nick Park, Oscar-winning creator of Wallace and Gromit | Media | The Guardian Share on Messenger Close In a warehouse on a corner of an industrial estate on the outskirts of Bristol, the next instalment of the adventures of an absent-minded inventor and his rather more intelligent dog is slowly - very slowly - taking shape. Friendly teams of animators work with quiet intensity in the gloom of the basement.

Upstairs, it is as though the artists Jake and Dinos Chapman have turned their attention to some of Britain's best-loved animated characters, with decapitated versions of Gromit and plasticine limbs scattered liberally around, and sketches and prototypes for new projects lining the walls. For Wallace and Gromit's creator, the diffident Nick Park, production on their latest adventure is reaching its busiest point. The 30-minute A Matter of Loaf and Death - in which both Wallace and Gromit find romance - will form the centrepiece of BBC1's Christmas schedule, as well as marking a return to television for Aardman Animations after a successful excursion into feature films. But while Chicken Run and The Curse of the Were-Rabbit were both big box office successes, grossing $175m (£88m) and $190m respectively in the cinema alone, the marriage between Aardman and Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks was a rocky one - and was followed by a painful split.

"After doing two features back to back, Chicken Run and Were-Rabbit, they were such enormous processes to go through taking years and years, I just wanted to get back to doing something I could be more in control of again," Park says. "Because it's primarily for the BBC, I'm not getting constant notes about how it's going to work in middle America, or how some kid doesn't understand what some northern phrase is." Towards the end, the relationship with DreamWorks became "a sort of a battle", he admits. Chicken Run, Aardman's first feature film, was "exciting" and a huge learning curve. But, faced with Park's determination to preserve the integrity of the characters he created while still a struggling film student - he came to Aardman in 1985 after its founders Peter Lord and David Sproxton spotted his talent - Hollywood executives wielding focus group studies and test screening results were always going to come off second best. "They really wanted us to do a Wallace and Gromit film but at the same time they also had half a mind on how they could make it work in the States. That was always the question," Park says.

"It was a great experience and I feel very proud of the end result. But we had to dig our heels in an awful lot. I don't mind that, it was just the effort that goes into that is a stress in itself." Aardman fought hard to retain the rights to the characters, which left DreamWorks feeling uncomfortable about losing control of an area almost as important to the bottom line as the box office take. "They found it difficult working with characters they didn't own," says Park. "They were trying to respect that at the same time as trying to completely dictate to us. There was a sense of tension." After the Hollywood dream turned sour, reaching its nadir with the disappointing non-Park CGI film Flushed Away, both sides walked away and Aardman signed a new contract with Sony Pictures. Park concurs that, after the animation boom of the mid-1990s with clever family films that could appeal equally to kids and adults - Toy Story, Shrek, Finding Nemo and so on - there was a feeling that Hollywood had fallen out of love with animation. But he thinks Aardman's new relationship with Sony will blossom.

The studio has three non-Park films about to be green-lit - Pirates (directed by Lord), The Cat Burglars (overseen by the co-director of The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Steve Box) and Arthur Christmas. And, while DreamWorks was pushing the studio more towards CGI, Sony is happy for it to combine computer techniques with Park's beloved claymation. He still recalls the moment when he alighted upon it as his medium of choice. "I suddenly saw what a magical effect it had. Everybody knows what a lump of clay is and seeing it come to life is quite a magical thing. You can see the material and see it moving and suddenly gaining a character somehow," he says. Park says it is unlikely there will ever be another Wallace and Gromit movie, but more television specials remain a possibility. He adds he also has an idea for another feature but is concentrating on A Matter of Loaf and Death for the time being. "All of our stuff has taken time to grow on people. It started small and had this long, slow, organic growth.

You can't knock stuff out quick if it's going to be good." Park's features have a tendency towards comic over-expression, presumably a side-effect of years of showing animators how he wants a character's eyes or face to move. And, while polite to a fault, he's not at ease talking about himself, and it's not hard to guess that he would rather be downstairs in the dark of the studio with his characters than talking about them. Or, indeed, nose deep in a freshly delivered copy of the Beano. In between his Wallace and Gromit duties, Park has guest-edited the 70th anniversary issue of the comic, published later this month. As he hunches over the edition in his cluttered corner office, it is an achievement that appears to mean as much to him as the Oscars haphazardly displayed around his office - in what appears to be the ultimate accolade, he even features in the concluding frame of the Fred's Bed strip. "I've been a fan of it all my life. My dream was to draw for the Beano," he enthuses. "When I was 10 years old I started drawing cartoon strips with the Beano in mind. I lived in that world.

You own a comic, it's yours and adults don't understand it. You could pile them up under the bed and if you were off school ill, you'd go through them all." And with that, Park is off into a halting reverie about growing up in 1960s Preston, "where everything looked like it was still from the 1950s". About spending the whole of Christmas Day in 1971 sitting in a box reading his new Beano album, hurtling down side streets on homemade go-karts or "trolleys", dreaming up Wallace-style inventions with his brothers, and spending hours in the heat of his parent's loft working on his animations with his mother's home movie camera. It was Dennis the Menace, The Bash Street Kids and Lord Snooty that inspired him to pick up a pen, as he lovingly copied out their adventures. And there are clear parallels between the world inhabited by Wallace and Gromit - warmly nostalgic and located somewhere between the 1940s and the present, yet somehow timeless - and that contained between the covers of his beloved Beano. "It's a bit like the way Ealing comedies have influenced our work here.

The surburbness of it and the Britishness of it," he muses. "There's a certain quirkiness. The way Dandy set a cowboy in a strange northern town. There's a slightly bizarre incongruity to it. The Curse of the Were-Rabbit was a Universal horror movie set in the north of England." Aardman's Bristol base does indeed feel a long way from the bright lights of Hollywood, or even the gossip and bustle of the London media world. As Park itches to disappear downstairs, back on to the production floor, it's easy to imagine that the distance between his parent's loft and Aardman HQ is not so great. "It's what I love. As I get on and films take four years to complete, I tend to have a hankering for very short projects so you can move on to the next idea. It's the ideas I'm interested in. What comes out of your head." The company was for a time the poster child for the British film industry, with Park's grin and comedy bow ties lighting up several otherwise dull Oscar nights.

But it has also had its disappointments in its 36-year history, which takes in Morph, Creature Comforts, Shaun the Sheep and a slew of advertising work. There was the fire that destroyed decades worth of drawings, and several points where intermittent work caused cashflow problems, or large-scale projects were started only to founder. But with another new commission for a CBeebies Shaun the Sheep spin-off (called Timmy) also in the bag, and its relationship with Hollywood clearer, Aardman seems set fair. "We never know how long it's going to last. We keep going through darker times and then Shaun the Sheep will take off or something else will turn up," Park says - although he is less optimistic about British animation as a whole, which he fears "seems to be at a low ebb". Park is back to eyeing the Beano on the desk between us with a mixture of pride and incredulity. "There is nothing like it. It's a one-off quirky thing that has come out of a certain culture. There's a lot of quirkiness, creativity and imagination." He is talking about the comic but he could, of course, be describing himself.

Curriculum vitae Education Sheffield Art School; National Film and Television School, Beaconsfield Career highlights (all at Aardman) 1989 Creature Comforts; A Grand Day Out 1993 The Wrong Trousers Wallace & Gromit: The Best of Aardman Animation (Video 1996) - IMDb IMDb There was an error trying to load your rating for this title. Some parts of this page won't work property. Please reload or try later. X Beta I'm Watching This! Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends. Error Wallace & Gromit: The Best of Aardman Animation ( 1996 ) 1h 15min A collection of some of the most popular work featuring Wallace and Gromit.

Director: a list of 36 titles created 05 Apr 2011 a list of 33 titles created 18 Feb 2012 a list of 35 titles created 23 Oct 2013 a list of 37 titles created 16 Jun 2015 a list of 42 titles created 10 months ago Title: Wallace & Gromit: The Best of Aardman Animation (Video 1996) 8.6/10 Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. You must be a registered user to use the IMDb rating plugin. A compilation of the first three Wallace & Gromit short films: "A Grand Day Out", "The Wrong Trousers", and "A Close Shave". Stars: Peter Sallis, Anne Reid Wallace and his dog, Gromit, open a bakery and get tied up with a murder mystery. But, when Wallace falls in love Gromit is left to solve the case.

Director: Nick Park 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 7.8/10 X Wallace takes a break from trying to decide on a holiday destination only to find he has no cheese for his crackers. The solution to both problems is a trip to the moon, with dog Gromit, because everybody knows the moon's made of cheese. Director: Nick Park Wallace falls for Wendolene, a wool shop owner, while Gromit is framed for the sheep rustling. Director: Nick Park Wallace is used by a criminal penguin in a robbery involving mechanical trousers. Director: Nick Park A humourous and thought provoking view of what animals in zoos might be thinking about their captivity and surroundings. Director: Nick Park Wallace and Gromit try out a number of their latest inventions which rarely work as planned. Stars: Peter Sallis Wallace introduces correspondents, inventors and experts who explain various real-life contraptions, inventions and scientific accomplishments.

Stars: Peter Sallis, Ashley Jensen, Jem Stansfield Creature Comforts (TV Series 2003) Animation | Comedy | Family Stop-motion animated series with a cast of animals, sound-biting on a specific topic each episode, such as creatures' sporting adventures, Christmas, and visits to veterinarians. The show ... See full summary » Stars: The Great British Public, David Rafique Wallace and his loyal dog, Gromit, set out to discover the mystery behind the garden sabotage that plagues their village and threatens the annual giant vegetable growing contest. Directors: Steve Box, Nick Park Stars: Peter Sallis, Helena Bonham Carter, Ralph Fiennes Shaun the Sheep (TV Series 2007) Animation | Comedy | Family Shaun is a sheep who doesn't follow the flock - in fact, he leads them into all sorts of scrapes and scraps, turning peace in the valley into mayhem in the meadow. Shaun and his pals run ... See full summary » Stars: John Sparkes, Justin Fletcher, Richard Webber Wallace and Gromit | fictional characters | Britannica.com fictional characters THIS IS A DIRECTORY PAGE. Britannica does not currently have an article on this topic.

The characters Wallace (left) and Gromit in Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005), directed by Nick Park and Steve Box. © DreamWorks Home Entertainment/PRNewsFoto/AP Images A scene from Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005), directed by Nick Park and Steve Box. © DreamWorks/Toronto International Film Festival/AP Images Learn about this topic in these articles: BBC - Bristol - History - An animated history You are in: Bristol > History > Historic Figures > An animated history Gromit gets to work in the new film An animated history By Caron Parsons As Aardman prepare to bring Wallace and Gromit back to the small screen, we take a look at the 30 year history of the company which brought us that cheese-loving dynamic duo. 1976 - Aardman Animations is set up by Peter Lord and David Sproxton and named after a cartoon character they created for the BBC series Vision On. Its headquarters are in Bristol. 1977 - Lord and Sproxton create a claymation character named Morph who soon becomes a big hit on children's show Take Hart.

1982 - Channel 4 commission a short series of conversation pieces. 1985 - Fresh from the National Film and Television School, a certain Nick Park joins the animation team at Aardman. He works on completing A Grand Day Out, Wallace and Gromit's first adventure in which the duo build a rocket and blast off to the moon in search of cheese, which he had begun as a student. Lady Tottington stars in the new film 1986 - The Aardman team produce the ground-breaking Sledgehammer video for singer Peter Gabriel. 1989 - Another commission from Channel 4 results in a series of pieces based on real people's experiences lip-synched onto animated characters. These include War Story and Creature Comforts. 1990 - A Grand Day Out is nominated for an Oscar but is beaten by another Nick Park short, Creature Comforts - which went on to become a series of highly successful Heat Electric ads before returning to TV in 2003 - but it does win a Bafta.

1993 - Wallace and Gromit's second adventure is BBC commission The Wrong Trousers in which the pair take in a lodger who turns out to be a villainous jewel thief, and penguin to boot. The short wins Nick Park a second Oscar and introduces Steve Box to the team as lead animator on the penguin. Former Speedwell School pupil Box goes on to co-direct the latest Were-Rabbit feature film. 1995 - A Close Shave is the third outing for the inventor and his hound and this story of a psychopathic mechanical dog and his sinister sheep dealings makes it an Oscar hat-trick for the studio. 1999 - Aardman sign a reportedly £167m deal with Steven Spielberg's Dreamworks company to make five feature films. 2000 - The first film of the new partnership, Chicken Run, filmed at a new feature department at Aztec West, is released and proves a big hit. Work on a second film Tortoise and the Hare begins, but after months of work runs into pre-production difficulties and is put on hold - though Aardman insist it will return.

2002 - Cracking Contraptions - a series of 10 animated five minute stories - are launched on the web and later screened by the BBC. Each is animated by a different person and looks at weird inventions created by Wallace. The series helps train the animators in the "way of Wallace" before work begins on the film. May 2005 - At the Cannes Film Festival Aardman announce that John Cleese will be writing their next feature film - a "pre-historic" comedy with the working title of Crood Awakening. 2005 - Wallace and Gromit hit the big screen in Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit - which has taken three years to produce. Wallace and Gromit week March 2006 - The Curse of the Were-Rabbit wins the Academy Award for best animated feature - to the delight of the whole city. A campaign is immediately mounted for a statue to be erected in Bristol in their honour. The Aardman deal goes down the toilet September 2006 - Aardman celebrate 30 years of animation and receive the Freedom of the City of Bristol.

2006 - The latest "Aardman film", Flushed Away, is released. The film, about a group of rats and voiced by Hugh Jackman and Kate Winslett, has a limited connection with the Bristol company and is shot entirely in Los Angeles at the Dreamworks studios that produced Shark Tale and Shrek. Made using CGI rather than claymation characters, it is however still counted as part of the original five picture deal. 2006 - Shaun the Sheep, the woolly star of the Wallace and Gromit short A Close Shave, gets his own show on CBBC. Jan 2007 - Aardman and Dreamworks end their five-film deal early, after Flushed Away and Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit reportedly underperformed. Dreamworks said the firms now had "different business goals", while Aardman said their "ambitions have moved apart". April 2007 - Aardman agrees a three-year deal with Sony Pictures. October 2007 - Aardman announce that Wallace and Gromit are set to return in a half-hour television adventure - the first since 1995's A Close Shave.

last updated: 16/03/2008 at 15:23 created: 31/01/2007 Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit (2005) Feature Length Theatrical Animated Film Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit (2005) Feature Length Theatrical Animated Film Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit Wallace & Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit (2005) Feature Length Theatrical Animated Film BCDB Rating: This page has been viewed 79 times this month, and 4377 times total. Feature Length Animated FilmFeature Animation Studio: Aardman Animations Distributed by: DreamWorks SKG, Cartoon Characters: Wallace, Victor Quartermaine, Lady Campanula Tottington, PC Mackintosh, Reverend Clement Hedges, Mrs. Mulch, Mr. Windfall, Miss Blight, Mr. Caliche, Miss Thripp, Mr. Growbag, Mr. Mulch, Mr. Crock, Mrs. Girdling.

Voice Actors: Peter Sallis, Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter, Peter Kay, Nicholas Smith, Liz Smith, John Thomson, Mark Gatiss, Vincent Ebrahim; Full Voice Cast .. . Directed By Nick Park, Steve Box. Produced By Nick Park, Peter Lord. Written By Bob Baker, Nick Park. Awards: Academy Award Winner, Best Animated Feature, 2006. Music: Julian Nott. Editor: David McCormick, Gregory Perler. Originally Released on October 07, 2005 The curse of the wererabbit | Wallace and Gromit The curse of the wererabbit Wallace and Gromit’s latest business venture – a human pest-control outfit called ‘Anti-Pesto’ – is booming, but with days to go before the Giant Vegetable Competition, the enterprising duo are finding it hard to manage all the captive rabbits taking over West Wallaby Street. As if that wasn’t enough to keep them busy, they’ve now been tasked with tracking down the mysterious beast that’s been decimating the town’s vegetable plots.

With the fate of Lady Tottington’s much-loved giant vegetable competition hanging in the balance, can Wallace and Gromit save the day before the snooty Victor Quartermaine gets all the glory? Cast & Crew Nick Park, Steve Box, Bob Baker & Mark Burton Cast Characters Lady Campanula Tottington Lady Campanula Tottington is a beautiful and wealthy spinster, and owner of the grand Tottington Hall, home of the Giant Vegetable Competition. She longs for romance but suspects her suitor, the rather oily Victor Quarteramaine, may not really be 'the one'... Victor Quatermaine Something of a smooth operator, Victor Quatermaine is of aristocratic stock – he just doesn’t have a penny to his name. Setting his sights on the rich Lady Tottington, he’ll do anything to get in her good books. Perhaps tracking down the 'beast' who is ravaging the town's vegetable plots is a good way to start, even if he'll have to use devious means to do so... Hutch A cute, though hungry, little bunny captured by Anti-Pesto and used in Wallace's fateful experiment to cure offending rabbits of their veg ravaging behaviour.

Hutch transpires to be a useful, if somewhat unpredictable bunny. The Were-Rabbit Beware the moon! In the dark of the night someone or something has been terrorising the gardens and veg-plots in Wallace and Gromit’s neighbourhood. When it turns out to be a giant veg-eating-rabbit-monster, it’s up to the Anti-Pesto team to track it down and prevent it from ruining Lady Tottington's competition. Gromit does his best, but Wallace never seems to be around to help out when the monster strikes... Awards Best Animated Feature Factfile Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit was released in over 3,000 theatres worldwide on October 14, 2005 and remained number one at the worldwide box office for three weeks in a row. The original film title was "The Great Vegetable Plot", but this was later changed to appeal to a wider, international audience. The film took 5 years to develop from concept to premiere and was shot entirely in Britain.

An all-star cast was recruited for the new characters in this film, including Ralph Fiennes as Victor Quartermaine, Helena Bonham Carter as Lady Tottington and Peter Kay as PC Mackintosh. Curse of the Were-Rabbit earned Nick Park a fourth Oscar® and "Best Animated Feature" at the Academy Awards®. Own the film Wallace | Wallace and Gromit Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia Date of birth: 7th August 1959 Age: 55 Wallace Herbertson is an inventor, main protagonist and half of the title duo of "Wallace & Gromit ". He delights in creating elaborate contraptions that often do not work as intended. He is a self-proclaimed genius, evident from his exclamation when he discovers Hutch's borrowed skill, a talent for all things mechanical. Most of Wallace's inventions look not unlike the designs of Heath Robinson and Rube Goldberg; creator Nick Park has said of Wallace that all his inventions are designed around the principle of "using a sledgehammer to crack a nut". He is also very eccentric and funny, and is always willing to provide a good laugh or listen to one himself.

Wallace can usually be found wearing a white shirt, brown wool trousers, green knitted pullover and a red tie. He loves all types of cheese, but his favorite brand of all is Wensleydale , as proven in A Grand Day Out. Wallace is so obsessed with cheese that it seems he couldn't live anywhere without it, and he himself admits in The Curse of the Were Rabbit that he is simply "crackers about cheese." He is also very disappointed when his friends are shown to have a dislike of cheese, such as in A Close Shave , when his love interest Wendolene Ramsbottom said she was allergic to cheese and "couldn't stand the stuff", he ended his relationship to her. He also likes crackers, describing them as "cracking". He also likes tea in the afternoon and is shown to have a liking to toast for breakfast; he describes toast in The Wrong Trousers as "cracking" as well. The thought of Lancashire hotpot keeps him going in a crisis. He enjoys a nice cup of tea or a drop of Bordeaux red for those special occasions. He reads the Morning Post, the Afternoon Post and the Evening Post and occasionally Ay-Up!, which is a parody of Hello! magazine.

Wallace in A Grand Day Out Some of Wallace's contraptions actually are based on a real-life invention. For example, Wallace's method of getting up in the morning incorporates a bed that tips over to wake up its owner, an invention that was exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851 by Theophilus Carter, and is similar to a device sold in Japan that is used to ensure a certain wakeup time. The jelly-toast contraption that gives him breakfast in the morning also bears a similarity to a Rube Goldberg -type machine, with the ability to do more than one thing at the same time. His versatile nature and inventor abilities have caused him to be hired for a wide variety of jobs. In A Close Shave, he was a window cleaner along with Gromit. In The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, he was a pest controller, and in A Matter of Loaf and Death, he was a baker. He has a kindly nature, and is perhaps a little over-optimistic. At times he can be inadvertently selfish and inconsiderate, but always means well and has a good heart. Nick Park says of Wallace: "He's a very self-contained figure.

A very homely sort who doesn't mind the odd adventure." Wallace is loosely based on Park's father, whom he described in a radio interview as "an incurable tinkerer." He described one of his father's constructions, a combination of a beach hut and trailer, having curtains in the windows, bookshelves on the walls, and full-sized furniture bolted to the floor. Wallace as he appeared in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. In the first photo shown on The Curse of the Were-Rabbit , it was revealed that once, when Gromit was little, Wallace had much hair and moustache and, on the photo that shows Gromit's graduation from "Dogwarts University", Wallace had lost his moustache, but still had a little hair. The reason behind Wallace's loss of hair is unknown. In A Matter of Loaf and Death , when Wallace is talking to Gromit, a picture is seen behind Gromit of Wallace with a brown moustache and brown hair. Both Wallace and Gromit live together at the ficticious address of 62 West Wallaby Street , Wigan, Lancashire.

However, his accent as voiced by Peter Sallis is from Sallis' native Holme Valley in Yorkshire but in 2007, Wallace made a cameo appearance on Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends in the episode "Ticket to Rod" and he was voiced by Dwight Schultz . In the National Trust's A Jubilee Bunt-a-thon short film, all games except Project Zoo, and Wallace And Gromit's Musical Marvels At The Proms, he was voiced by Aardman Team Member, Ben Whitehead . In Project Zoo, Wallace is voiced by Peter Sallis. Contents Add a photo to this gallery Trivia Wallace was originally a postman named, Jerry, but Nick Park felt the name did not fit with Gromit . Wallace has a different look in A Grand Day Out, his top of his head is smaller, bigger ears and his mouth is not so wide. In 2009, Nick Park said Wallace is born on the 7th August 1959, So Wallace is currently 57 Years old.

In Season 1 Episode 2 of Rex The Runt, Wallace is a cameo as a window cleaner, cleaning rex's window, before being knocked down by rex This page uses Creative Commons Licensed content from Wikipedia ( view authors) . Wardrobe Wallace's usual day clothes is a green knitted pullover, a white shirt, brown colored trousers and red tie. In " Curse of the Were-Rabbit ", Wallace is sometimes wearing the Anti-Pesto uniform and cap. In " The Last Resort ", after Wallace gets all the things he need for the Seaside in the cellar, Wallace is wearing an orange tie, a red shirt with white stripes, and red trousers. In " The Bogey Man ", after Gromit makes Wallace join Prickly Thicket, Wallace is wearing an Prickly Thicket official tank top instead of his pullover for the rest of the episode. Quotes

Question: Who is the creator of animated characters Wallace and Gromit?
Answer: Nick Park