There’s a fascinating box office match-up brewing in Spain this weekend between DreamWorks Animation’s Penguins of Madagascar and the homegrown Spanish CGI feature Mortadelo y Filemón contra Jimmy el Cachondo, which will be released by Warner Bros. The latter is based on Francisco Ibáñez’s beloved comic book characters Mortadelo y Filemón (Mort & Phil), and as you’ll see in the trailer below, they’ve got the same slapstick-spy setup as the penguins:
This new CG film, however, is an ambitious production, and judging by the trailer, sets a new standard for CG feature animation out of Spain. The director is Oscar-nominated and Goya-winning director Javier Fesser who produced the film out of Madrid-based Ilion Animation Studios, best known in the States for the feature Planet 51. The studio is currently gearing up for another stateside project with the burgeoning Paramount Animation.
The film’s budget was reportedly around US$12.5 million when the project was announced a couple years ago. It’s been difficult to find an updated figure, but even if the film cost double that amount, it’s still a handsome-looking production for its relatively small budget.
Check back on Sunday to see how the local Spanish spies fared against DreamWorks’s Los Pingüinos de Madagascar.
