Production house Curious Pictures was recently nominated for an Annie in the best animated commercial category against our own Jamie Caliri. They will be airing an original animated special on NBC tomorrow. It looks a bit average to me, but I guess I’m a bit biased. I do like Duncan Sheik though… his Spring Awakening stuff is fantastic! Details below…

Presenting an exciting new original animated holiday special entitled Little Spirit: Christmas in New York, which will air on NBC Wednesday, December 10th from 8-9 p.m. and features the voices of Danny DeVito, Lucy Liu, Freddy Rodriguez, Brian Williams and Brenda Song. The music is by Duncan Sheik with Christmas classics sung by Faith Hill. This unique program stylistically blends the look of traditional painting with contemporary 3-D technology - creating an aesthetic that is both classic and innovative.

Click HERE to view the trailer and an exclusive behind the scenes look at Little Spirit: Christmas in New York.

When a friendly cabbie (Danny DeVito) tells two young sisters the story of a boy named Leo who moved to Manhattan with his family, a magical adventure begins. While adjusting to the big city and enjoying the days leading up to Christmas, Leo accidentally loses his dog Ramona in Central Park. Leo is devastated by his loss until a magical creature named Little Spirit appears and takes him on a quest to find Ramona. Leo and Little Spirit venture out on the journey of a lifetime, taking in the festive surroundings of the city and meeting people from all walks of life. By the time Leo is reunited with Ramona, he has an eclectic group of friends that make the strange city seem like home.

Click HERE for a sneak peek of Little Spirit on NBC.com.
Click HERE to read about Little Spirit in Advertising Age.
Click HERE to read about Little Spirit on the Animation World Network.

Yes, the Olympics are still weeks away but I am already frightened by the pending propaganda that NBC will force down our throats as we attempt to watch the Olympics. The ads, promos, and bugs have already been splattered on NBC for wks now. It will be nonstop China all the time. Everyone wants to talk about China as the next big thing. All these American business analysts from CNBC to FOX are salivating for China to somehow surpass the US. I love that our own freedoms as a nation all us to hope that our own nation falters. It’s uplifting. I bet Francis Scott Key would have found this ideology down right inspiring! China is not a wonderland. (BTW, talking about China and India in business is SOOOOOOo 2005. If your business leader brings them up in a mtg, tell him/her to catch up on his/her media-communications readings.) China is an economic dynamo. Its economy has been exploding and will continue to explode. Why? It’s because they have a sh!tload of people and are willing to exploit as many of them as possible. I wonder if the poor in China are treated better than the poor in the USSR say in the 1950s. I know nothing about this but guess that the treatments are probably on par. China went from a communist nation-based ideology to a capitalistic consumption-based one today. That is what china is. In all those apocalyptic films about the world running out of resources and people just flat out wasting everything, or in other words, the type of American traits that actually led to the rise of Al Qaeda’s ideology (I’m happy to refer anyone to the BBC documentary that outlines this), China now best embodies that sheer gluttony and wastefulness. As I’ve been a proponent of the great documentary Up the Yangtze, i think that film does a great job of providing some commentary on just how f-ed up everything is over. The rising Chinese aristocracy is not good for the overall population there. Everything seems to be done in the name of pride, progress, and modernity. Oh, and the Chinese government decided to through any Westerner with a visa out of China from June until October to ensure that there are not many protests against the Olympics.

China’s a fun place to visit and it’s certainly got rich histories in most of the arts and sciences, but let’s not kid ourselves and pretend that what they’ve got going on over there is some sort of utopia. They will lead the world in some fields in the coming years. I have no doubt in that, but despite that there is a Disneyland in hong kong, China is no Disneyland. It’s not a dream world. The aristocracy and government over there is not working in the people’s best interests. Then again, ours probably is not either. If only more countries could be like Belgium and Switzerland!

So while NBC is certain to give us no coverage of any non-American events, forcing die-hard viewers to visit the NBC Sports website at 3 a.m. to watch men’s basketball or ladies tennis, I remind you all not to take any of their propagnistic remarks about China to heart. If you are interested in learning something about China (since i am an admitted neophyte), then please take the Olympics as a chance to learn more about the social and economic issues that are not only affecting China but ultimately have to some degree, an effect on your own bottom line.