Pixar Animation vets tend to be a little obsessive about their creations. That protectiveness leads to bizarre conversations like when “Toy Story 3” director Lee Unkrich was telling the film’s writer, Michael Arndt, that, no, Mr. Potato Head just wouldn’t talk to Mrs. Potato Head like that, so can you please rewrite that bit of dialogue?

So you can imagine what Unkrich was thinking seven years ago when then-Disney chairman Michael Eisner, in the midst of contentious contract renewal talks, commissioned a third “Toy Story” movie without any involvement from the franchise's Pixar originators. (As part of its original deal, Disney controlled the rights to characters from Pixar’s first seven movies, all the way through “Cars.”)

“We felt like we had come home one day and our children had been taken from the house and were being raised by another family,” says Unkrich, whose movie has been nominated for both best picture and animated feature, as well as adapted screenplay. “And God bless those guys, they were just doing their jobs, but how do you carry the torch for characters you don’t really intimately know?”

The non-Pixar version of “Toy Story 3,” drafted by “Meet the Parents” writer Jim Herzfeld, had the toys shipping themselves to Taipei to rescue Buzz Lightyear, who had been recalled. The screenplay included Buzz offering a twist on his signature catchphrase, exclaiming, “To infinity and be-yotch.”

Needless to say, the line doesn’t pass the smell test with Unkrich, though, again, he harbors no ill will toward Herzfeld or anyone else involved, he said during an interview for a longer story.

“Someone asked me recently if I was ever interested in seeing what they did,” Unkrich says. “We stayed away from it, wanting to make our movie as if that had never happened. But now that we’re all done, I would like to see it. It’d be like high-end fan fiction, a glimpse into an alternate future that never came to be.”

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-- Glenn Whipp

"Toy Story 3" photo from Associated Press / Disney

To see the answer, click on the "Continue reading" link under the photos below.

 
Director Darren Aronofsky, Oscar-nominated for “Black Swan,” has plenty of experience with haters questioning his projects, his taste, his sanity. And the detractors are at it again, wondering why he’s wasting his time directing the “X-Men” offshoot “The Wolverine.” (Short answer: Money — both for himself and his movie’s budget.)

But for those Aronofsky true believers worried that the filmmaker behind such downbeat, indie favorites as “Requiem for a Dream” and “Pi” is turning conventional, the 42-year-old director reveals he’s not past pushing for ambitious projects on the level of “The Fountain,” his demanding Mobius strip meditation on love, death and religion.

Next up (“fingers crossed,” says Aronofsky): A sci-fi adaptation of the Noah’s Ark tale from the Book of Genesis.

“I’m a huge fan,” Aronofsky says, noting his interest goes back to childhood when he saw the low-budget Sunn Classic Pictures documentary “In Search of Noah’s Ark” at a movie theater.

Aronofsky has been working on the screenplay for the past six years and plans on soon publishing the first of a four-part graphic novel based on his story and drawn by Canadian artist Nico Henrichon. He hopes the novel will secure studio financing so he can move forward with the film after finishing “The Wolverine.”

Aronofsky’s Noah might be a bit different from the bearded boat-builder most remember from the Bible. Aronofsky sees Noah as the “first environmentalist,” a complicated character tormented by surviving an apocalypse as well as the “first person to plant vineyards, drink wine and get drunk.”

In other words: Don’t plan on bringing the family to this biblical epic.

“I was stunned going back and realizing how dirty some of those stories are,” Aronofsky says. “They’re not PG in any way. They’re all about sleeping with your brother’s sister who gives you a child who you don’t know. That kind of stuff got censored out of our religious upbringing.”

 — Glenn Whipp

Photo of Darren Aronofsky by Liz O. Baylen / Los Angeles Times

If you're an aspiring singer in the fifth grade in Staten Island, N.Y., a school field trip to California in February would be cool. But what about a field trip that includes singing at Disneyland and the Oscars? That's super cool.

That's what the kids in the choir at Public School 22 are preparing for. Oscar telecast producer Bruce Cohen said Elizabeth Banks introduced him to the P.S. 22 choir online, and when he got the job to work on the show, he immediately thought of inviting them. The students learned in mid-December that they would be going to the Academy Awards. Co-host Anne Hathaway, a fan of the chorus, delivered the news in person at the school.

"All of a sudden, the lights shined and there was Anne Hathaway and her hair was glowing!" remembered one student named Jonathan, 10. "Everybody was crying so hard, especially the girls." (School officials asked that the children's last names not be published.)

At the Feb. 27 Academy Awards, the students will sing "Over the Rainbow," which was written for "The Wizard of Oz" and won an Oscar in 1939. Read more about the kids here, and check out some super-cute photos here.

-- Melissa Maerz and Nicole Sperling

Photo: Children from the fifth grade at P.S. 22, led by Chorus Director Gregg Breinberg, rehearse Friday in their school auditorium in Staten Island, N.Y. Credit: Jennifer S. Altman/For The Times

Two days before "Inception" pulled off an upset at the BAFTA Awards in the race for production design, I powwowed with future winner Guy Dyas at the Hollywood Museum. He's an Oscar nominee in a fascinating race — and one he could win if trends continue in his category.

Normally, the Oscar and BAFTA Award for art direction go to the most ornate, bombastic decoration in films set back in historic times, like previous Oscar champs "Sweeney Todd," "Moulin Rouge" and "Shakespeare in Love."

Movies with a contemporary or futuristic look don't usually fare well, but "Avatar" won both prizes last year. Does "Inception's" victory at BAFTA bode well for its next face-off at the Academy Awards? It competes against most of the same contenders it trounced at BAFTA: "Alice in Wonderland," "The King's Speech" and "True Grit." The only difference: BAFTA nominee "Black Swan" is bumped by "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1" on Feb. 27.

The British academy and the Oscars share many voters. About 500 members of BAFTA are among the 5,800 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which is a significant overlap, but there are differences in their voting processes. All Oscar voters can decide the winner, but only art directors determine who wins that BAFTA category.

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— Tom O'Neil

Photo: Guy Dyas. Credit: Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images.

The Sundance Film Festival’s sale scoreboard can record two more deals. Magnolia Pictures has acquired North American rights to Alex Gibney and Alison Ellwood’s documentary “Magic Trip,” while Sony Pictures Classics has picked up North American, Australian and New Zealand rights to actress-director Vera Farmiga’s “Higher Ground.”

More than three dozen Sundance movies have been sold after their screenings in Park City, Utah, and Monday’s deals are not the first for Magnolia or Sony Classics. Terms of the deals were not disclosed.

Magnolia previously announced its deals for Mark Pellington’s “I Melt With You” and Jason Eisener’s “Hobo With a Shotgun.” Sony Classics bought John Michael McDonagh’s “The Guard,” Jeff Nichols’ “Take Shelter” and Morgan Spurlock’s “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold.”

“Magic Trip” is a look at author Ken Kesey and his Merry Prankster’s American road trip. “Higher Ground,” adapted from the memoir “This Dark World: A Memoir of Salvation Found and Lost,” centers on a woman (played by Farmiga) struggling to find meaning while growing up in an evangelical church.

— John Horn

Photo: Norbert Leo Butz and Vera Farmiga in "Higher Ground." Credit: Molly Hawkey.

It was no big surprise, really, that "The King's Speech" dominated the BAFTA awards Sunday night. It is, after all, the hometown film, even though audiences stateside have embraced it wholeheartedly as well. So it was a bit of a shock when David Fincher beat out Tom Hooper for best director over there on the "King's" turf. Fincher's "The Social Network" was the early Oscar favorite but saw its chances fade once  "The King's Speech" started its drive. (The surprise win for Tom Hooper at last month's Directors Guild of America awards was a big spark in the turnaround.)

Is there now a possibility that "The Social Network" and "The King's Speech" could split the two big prizes on Oscar night, with Fincher walking away with best director while "The King's Speech" wins best picture? It's happened before, most recently in 2005 with "Crash" winning best picture and Ang Lee winning best director with "Brokeback Mountain," and again in 2002 when "Chicago" won best picture and Roman Polanski was awarded the best director statue for "The Pianist."

It could happen again, and anecdotally, I've heard motion picture academy members talking in such fashion. But how much influence do the  BAFTA awards have on the Oscars? According to my colleague Tom O'Neil, there are about 500 British Academy of Film and Television Arts members who are also members of the 5,800-member American academy. And the two award shows' choices have matched up four times in the last decade when the BAFTAs moved their show up earlier than the Oscars. 

It is significant, though, that the BAFTAs didn't go with one of their own Sunday evening, especially considering how Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and Helena Bonham Carter dominated the acting prizes. Rather, the British Academy chose Fincher for his job directing 20-somethings in their founding of Facebook. The BAFTAs also chose Aaron Sorkin, for adapted screenplay, a scenario we are likely to find repeated at the Oscars. "The Social Network" also won for editing, besting both "Inception" and "The King's Speech," a category many say you need to win to get best picture.

There are only two weeks to go till the big night and ballots are due a week from tomorrow. Most voters probably already have their minds made up.

-- Nicole Sperling

Let's get really snide about the, ahem, least wonderful Grammy performances.

Obviously, Jennifer Lopez was thinking what we were thinking when she squirmed during Bob Dylan's gruntfest with the Avett Brothers and Mumford & Sons: Where's that Soy Bomb guy when you need him?

At age 68, Barbra Streisand isn't even trying to sing anymore. She barely walked through "Evergreen."

Soon after Lady Gaga popped out of that egg to sing, she laid a bigger one on stage.

If Gwyneth Paltrow tries one more time to prove she's a singer as well as an actress, she's gotta give back that Oscar.

Christina Aguilera proved that her screaming fiasco at the Super Bowl was no fluke.

Justin Bieber with Jaden Smith: twice as chuckle-worthy.

The only thing worse than Katy Perry's attempt to sing was her attempt to dance.

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-- Tom O'Neil

Photo: Bob Dylan, second from right, performs at the Grammys. Credit: Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times

After losing the Grammy Award for best new artist to jazz singer Esperanza Spalding and the award for pop vocal album to Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber was surprisingly candid backstage.

"I worked really hard these past few years and you know, I'm not going to lie — I was disappointed," Bieber told MTV News. "But, you know, I'm gonna come back [next year] and we'll take a few home."

The losses have inspired him to "work harder than I did last year," he added. "It's going to be hard, but I'm going to try."

He tweeted to his fans, "As for the awards ... of course I wanted to win. Its been & still is a dream to win a grammy. Was I upset ... yes. But I was happy for her also. Someone said to me tonight its not your successes that define u but your failures. I lost ... but I don't plan on this being my last chance."

Some Bieber fans were so furious over the loss that they attacked Spalding's Wikipedia page with insults and threats. One poster told her to "go die in a hole." Later, the page was cleaned up.

Soon after the Grammycast, Awards Tracker asked our readers if Bieber was robbed at the Grammys by losing best new artist to Spalding. As of this writing, there were more than 1,300 responses who voiced their opinions below. There's still time to add your vote.

-- Tom O'Neil

Photo: Justin Bieber performing with Jaden Smith on the Grammy show. Credit: Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times

As expected, "The King's Speech" pulled off an impressive sweep at BAFTA, claiming seven awards, including the dual crowns as best picture and best British picture. That marked the first time both prizes went to the same movie since the category for best British film was re-introduced in 1992.

That combo probably clinches its top Oscar victory next. Ever since 2000, when BAFTA moved up its award ceremony to take place before the Academy Awards, the two prizes have agreed on best picture four times: "Gladiator" (2000), "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" (2003), "Slumdog Millionaire" (2008) and "The Hurt Locker" (2009). The victory by "Hurt Locker" surprised kudos-watchers.

Last year, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts correctly foretold the Oscar winners of supporting actor and actress. Could it be significant that Geoffrey Rush just beat Oscar front-runner Christian Bale ("The Fighter")? His "King's Speech" costar Helena Bonham Carter won supporting actress too, but she wasn't nominated against Oscar faves Melissa Leo ("The Fighter") and Hailee Steinfeld ("True Grit"). Or maybe their victories at these British film awards were to be expected considering Rush and Carter are subjects of the empire — he's an Aussie; she's a Brit.

Last year, BAFTA showed a strong preference for British thespians in the lead races, picking Colin Firth ("A Single Man") over eventual Oscar champ Jeff Bridges ("Crazy Heart") and Carey Mulligan ("An Education"), who had an easier time of it. She wasn't nominated against Sandra Bullock ("The Blind Side").