Brave
Change your fate.
Production
Budget
$185 000 000
Revenue
$538 983 207
Director
Scenario
Brenda Chapman
Author
Composer
Producer
Actors
Kelly Macdonald
Merida (voice)
Emma Thompson
Elinor (voice)
Billy Connolly
Fergus (voice)
Julie Walters
The Witch (voice)
Robbie Coltrane
Lord Dingwall (voice)
Kevin McKidd
Lord MacGuffin / Young MacGuffin (voice)
Craig Ferguson
Lord Macintosh (voice)
Peigi Barker
Young Merida (voice)
Short description
Brave is set in the Scottish Highlands, where Merida, the daughter of King Fergus and Queen Elinor, would rather ride and shoot her bow than accept the courtly role expected of her. When she refuses an old custom that the clan lords hold sacred, she throws the kingdom into disorder. Seeking a way to undo the damage, she turns to an eccentric elderly woman, whose magic brings consequences far beyond what Merida intended. Learning what courage really means becomes her only route back.
The film was directed by Brenda Chapman and Mark Andrews and written by Irene Mecchi, Chapman and Andrews, with Katherine Sarafian producing for Pixar and Walt Disney Pictures. It followed Chapman's The Prince of Egypt and preceded Come Away, while for Andrews it came after the short One Man Band; among Pixar's features it was the first directed by a woman. Kelly Macdonald voices Merida, with Emma Thompson as Elinor, Billy Connolly as Fergus, Julie Walters as the witch, and Robbie Coltrane and Kevin McKidd among the lords. Around 31 cast members and 275 crew are credited.
Released in June 2012, the film runs 93 minutes and cost about 185 million dollars, returning roughly 539 million worldwide, a strong result against its budget. It holds a 7.1 rating on IMDb from some 477,000 votes and a 7 on TMDB from over 14,000, while critics' reviews give it a 7, so audiences and reviewers landed in much the same place.
What's left behind the scenes
- The 'Planet Pizza' truck, appearing in every Pixar feature film except 'The Incredibles' (2004), can be spotted in the witch's cottage.
- Reese Witherspoon was originally intended to voice Princess Merida.
- During the preparatory work leading up to the film's shooting, 111,394 storyboard comics were drawn. 84,421 drawings ended up in the hands of Pixar editors and were subsequently used in the filming process.
- Merida has five different dresses, a cloak, a quiver, an arm guard, and a necklace in the film. Considering the torn clothing during her travels and various accessories, Merida has a total of 22 different ensembles. Additionally, she changes her hairstyle five times throughout the film.
- Animators created over 1,500 strands for Merida's hairstyle. Her hairstyle consisted of over 111,700 individual hairs in total.
- Fergus appears on screen in nine different outfits. Each of them has its own unique properties and had to be calculated separately on a computer. The same procedure was applied to Fergus's hair, luxuriant mustache, sporran [a leather pouch worn with traditional Scottish Highland dress], and scabbard. Hair on his arms and chest, as well as the fur on his boots and the fur on his bearskin cloak – all of this was digitized simultaneously.
- To achieve the fullness of Fergus's kilt, the fabric pleat across his chest was made eight layers thick. One layer was placed over another, and each independently interacted with the other layers and other items of clothing. The pleats on the kilt on the left, right, and back were made six layers thick.
- For each of the clans, the artists at Pixar came up with a unique design for the Scottish tartan pattern.
- The tartan pattern of the Dunbroch clan is physically impossible to reproduce using traditional Scottish weaving methods.
- The artists who painted the Dunbroch clan's ancestral castle drew inspiration from the silhouettes of Eilean Donan Castle in Scotland and Dunnottar Castle, which is located south of Stonehaven in Aberdeenshire. Archaeologists believe that the semi-ruined Dunnottar Castle was built in the 15th-16th centuries. Because of this castle, significant changes were made to the film's script. Initially, the scriptwriters planned to place the ancestral castle on the hills of Scotland. However, after seeing the picturesque location of Dunnottar, filmmakers decided to move the film's setting to the coast.
- 29 different clothing items were developed specifically for the film's secondary characters. Combined with various footwear and sporrans, this resulted in 94 unique outfits.
- Some of Pixar's artists had to temporarily retrain as professional tailors during filming. They created three-dimensional models of clothing on computers, based on sketches made during the preparation period. The three-dimensional elements were 'sewn' in a 3D modeling program, and then additional elements like fringe and ties were 'added'.
- The film is set in medieval Scotland, so when choosing materials for the costumes, filmmakers had to settle for wool and linen only.
- To 'sew' a believable emerald dress for Queen Elinor, the artists took a piece of fabric of the corresponding color, tinted it with metallic paint, and decorated it with jewelry. The artists from the character animation department were subsequently able to accurately replicate the fabric sample on the computer.
- The studio's artists created around 350 drawings of leaves, bushes, and moss to recreate the atmosphere of Scottish nature.
- The Callanish Standing Stones circle on the Isle of Lewis is the largest known megalithic monument on the British Isles. This monument inspired the artists at Pixar who painted the mysterious stone circle lost in the forest, where Merida finds herself.
- Pixar's first film with a girl as the main character.
- The film's original title was 'The Bear and the Bow'.
- Initially, 80% of the film's action took place in the snow. When director Brenda Chapman left the project, much of the 'white' went with her.
- None of the shots shown in the promotional trailer made it into the final film.
- Kelly Macdonald, Robbie Coltrane, Emma Thompson, Julie Walters, Craig Ferguson, Billy Connolly, and Kevin McKidd all appeared in films based on book series. Billy Connolly starred in "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events" (2004) – an adaptation of the first three books from the "A Series of Unfortunate Events" series: "The Bad Beginning," "The Reptile Room," and "The Wide Window." Kelly Macdonald, Robbie Coltrane, Emma Thompson, and Julie Walters all appeared in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2" (2011) – the last of the Harry Potter films, based on the 7th and final book, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," from the Harry Potter series. Craig Ferguson was in "Winnie the Pooh" (2011) and "How to Train Your Dragon" (2010), and Kevin McKidd starred in "Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief" (2010).
- Four of the actors (Kelly Macdonald, Robbie Coltrane, Emma Thompson, and Julie Walters) worked on the Harry Potter films. Thompson and Macdonald together participated in the films "Nanny McPhee" (2005) and "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2" (2011), though they do not share any scenes in the latter. "Braveheart" is their third joint film.
- This is the first Pixar film to revive an entire historical period.
- The unintelligible speech of the young MacGuffin (voiced by Kevin McKidd) is actually a form of Scottish dialect called Doric. This dialect is from McKidd's hometown – Elgin, Scotland.
- The character Lord Macintosh is a nod to Apple computers. Steve Jobs was one of the company's founders and played a major role at Pixar.
- A MacGuffin is a common term denoting an object, goal, or desire for which the main character is willing to do anything. Ironically, Lord MacGuffin and his offspring are the direct opposite. Merida is willing to give up everything to avoid dealing with them and the other suitors.
- The chess set in Merida's room is a well-known set of 12th-century Lewis chess pieces, discovered in Scotland in 1831.
- It took six years to make this film. Mark Andrews was initially a Scottish themes consultant for Brenda Chapman. However, by October 2010, Chapman had left the project after four years of working with Andrews, who subsequently took her place but left the story as Chapman had written it.
- Brenda Chapman based the image of Merida on her own daughter, and she based the image of Elinor on herself.
- Pixar developed two additional programs specifically for this film over three years. One of them allowed them to model Merida's curls so that they moved with her movements.
- This was the first film to utilize the Dolby Atmos sound system. The new system expanded on 5/7.1 systems, working with 64 discrete speakers and simultaneously with 128 lossless audio channels.
- Queen Elinor uses a fork when tasting the pie. Forks did not exist in Great Britain until the 17th century, and their widespread use on the British Isles only occurred in the 18th century.
- During scenes where Elinor tries to correct Merida's unladylike behavior, Elinor warns her daughter “not to chortle.” The word “chortle” did not exist until Lewis Carroll invented it for “Jabberwocky” (1977).
- In the falconry scene, one of the birds is a Harris's hawk, which is native to North and South America.
- During the rock climbing scenes and the subsequent waterfall, circling birds cry like red-tailed hawks, which inhabit North America.
- During the presentations of Princess Merida's suitors, one claims to have defeated a group of Vikings, another that he defeated the Romans. This is historically inaccurate, considering that Vikings did not visit Scotland until the 800s AD, which is 500 years after the Romans left the British Isles around 300 AD.
- Princess Merida was the first Pixar heroine included among the so-called "Disney Princesses".
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
