An inside look at Pixar

John Horn of the Los Angeles Times was given extensive inside access to Pixar Animation Studios when it was putting the finishing touches on "Cars," the upcoming summer movie based on Route 66.

This excerpt about when Mattel presented prototypes of "Cars" toys to director John Lasseter speaks volumes about the studio:

To any adult, and certainly almost every kid, the 20 or so toys looked pretty much exactly like the movie characters on which they were based. But Lasseter, a fervent toy collector, spotted two problems as soon as he approached the prototypes. The lifts on the forklift Guido (voiced in "Cars" by Pixar animation scientist Guido Quaroni) were splayed out like a bowlegged cowboy. And the chrome was missing from the spotlights on a 1949 Mercury Police Cruiser called Sheriff (performed by Route 66 historian Michael Wallis), making his lights look like oversized side-view mirrors. Even a larger, talking race car with dialogue recorded by the film's star, Owen Wilson, sounded wrong. "That's Owen? Really?" Lasseter asked. "If you went to the trouble of getting him, you might as well make it sound like him." The voice could be fixed, perhaps, but the Mattel team countered that to redesign the forklift, it would have to rebuild its molds at some expense. In order to repaint the police cruiser with chrome-colored trim, its production costs on the vehicle would rise. Lasseter's voice didn't rise, his face didn't turn red and he didn't gesticulate wildly. But for someone given to wearing Hawaiian shirts and hugging colleagues, he clearly interpreted what Mattel had to say as fighting words. "He's a forklift ," Lasseter said of Guido. "He has to have those things parallel."

The director was less patient discussing Sheriff's paint job. "Seriously, why don't you cut your profit margins on this and get it right?" Lasseter said, his irritation growing. "I am fighting for my characters here." Soon enough, the Mattel team said it would try to fix all of the problems.

Lasseter came back to the lighting session a few minutes later like a boxer returning to his corner. "Just enough time to kick some Mattel ass," he said as the gathering with the several dozen Pixar artists resumed. "I mean, if we made movies like that, we wouldn't be here."

There's also a firsthand view of the Pixar crew discussing and tweaking a crucial scene in the film, and much more.

It's one of the best stories about Pixar that I've read. Highly recommended.