The movie stars Dakota Fanning, Julia Roberts, and Oprah Winfrey and was nominated for three Critics’ Choice Awards, winning Best Family Film (Live Action).

Specs have yet to be revealed, but supplements will include: Commentary with Director Gary Winick; Commentary with Producer Jordan Kerner and visual effects supervisor John Andrew Berton Jr.; Making Some Movie; Some Voices; Flacka’s Pig Tales; How Do They Do That?; What Makes a Classic; Where Are They Now?; A Day at the Fair!; Farm Photo Album; Music Videos (Sarah McLachlan, “Ordinary Miracle” and Bob Carlisle and Lucy Kane, “Make a Wish”); Gag Reel; and Additional Scenes.

-via High Def Digest

Walden, which teamed with Kerner on “Charlotte’s Web,” will have an exclusive first look at all feature projects Kerner develops through his Kerner Entertainment shingle.

Announcement comes in conjunction with Kerner being appointed dean of the School of Filmmaking at North Carolina School of the Arts, where he’ll oversee 30 faculty members, 15 staff members and 260 undergraduate and graduate students. He plans to divide his time between Los Angeles and Winston-Salem.

Kerner’s produced such family films as “Snow Dogs,” “George of the Jungle,” “Inspector Gadget,” “The Three Musketeers” and the “Mighty Ducks” trilogy. He also teamed with Jon Avnet to produce “Fried Green Tomatoes,” “When a Man Loves a Woman,” “Up Close and Personal” and “Red Corner.”

Walden CEO Cary Granat said, “The films he’s produced fit perfectly into Walden’s mission of creating quality family entertainment that inspires and engages.”

[Variety]

Consumers bought 3.5 million DVDs in the first week after the title’s April 3 release, said Paramount Home Entertainment. By contrast, Disney’s “Narnia” sold about 4 million copies during its first day of release last Easter. (“Charlotte’s Web” earned $82.5 million in North American theaters vs. $292 million for “Narnia.”)

Easter is the second-biggest retail traffic period behind Christmas. The National Retail Federation projects Easter 2007 spending to come in at a record $14.4 billion, up from $12.6 billion last year. Average spending per person is projected at $135.07, up 11% from the previous year.

“Easter is gaining more relevance as a retail holiday,” said Phil Rist, vp strategy at BIGresearch, a consumer market intelligence firm.

The Easter holiday also is credited with keeping “Happy Feet” at the top of the Nielsen VideoScan sales chart for the week ending April 8. “Charlotte’s Web” debuted at No. 2, but the difference between the two titles was less than 6% — and sources said “Charlotte’s Web” was No. 1 at Wal-Mart, the biggest retailer of DVDs, which does not report data to Nielsen VideoScan.

Two other kid-themed DVDs that have been out for a while — “Peter Pan” and “Flushed Away” — climbed back up the chart during Easter week. “Peter Pan,” in its fifth week in stores, rose a notch to No. 7, while “Flushed Away,” available for seven weeks, shot up eight places to No. 10.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

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When she’s not feeding her husband, her 7-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son, Grant is at her home-office computer, feeding her imagination.

“I’m a screenwriter,” she said. “It’s writing the script for the movie. You write the dialogue. You write the description. You write the inner world of the characters.”

Grant wrote the screenplays for “28 Days,” “In Her Shoes” and “Erin Brockovich,” for which she earned an Oscar nomination. She co-wrote the screenplays for “Ever After” and “Pocahontas.”

Grant believes that parenting helps her craft.

“I think I’m a richer person for being a parent, and that can only reflect well on my work,” she said.

A Love of Reading and Writing Came Late

The red carpet premiere of “Charlotte’s Web” was the first time Grant and her husband, Chris Henrikson, exposed their kids to a Hollywood spectacle. They understand the importance of a good education for their children, though reading was not a high priority when Grant was a child.

“I avoided reading … very artfully. I resisted the whole concept of homework. It just seemed like a big imposition on my time,” she said. “So I didn’t really get reading until I was in high school. And then I got onboard and realized what a life enhancer it was.”

Thanks to developing a love of reading and writing, Grant is not only a screenwriter — she’s also a filmmaker. “Catch and Release,” starring Jennifer Garner, was Grant’s directorial debut. She also wrote the film’s screenplay.

While she loves directing, writing allows Grant to dictate her own schedule, something crucial for any mom.

“I get to sit and play around with my imagination all day long. I get to have a full career on my own schedule, which is the most valuable thing if you’re going to parent and work at the same time,” she said. “It’s a great job, and daily … I’m thankful that I landed in it.”

[ABC News]

The boujou match moving software from 2d3 was used by a team of CG artists and technicians at Rising Sun’s studios in Australia to produce the movie. The film starring Julia Roberts, Robert Redford and Dakota Fanning, is an adaptation of EB White’s classic novel.

The filmmakers had to combine live action, actors who would provide voice talent, live animals and animated characters such as Charlotte herself. RSP was engaged to create a fully digital photo-real Charlotte, one that could seamlessly interact with other characters, her environment and her very intricate webs.

Time and effort was devoted to her development to ensure she had the screen presence that was required for such a well-known and much loved character. Charlotte’s on-screen presence had to be realistic and convincing from a nature documentary perspective, as well as allow the audience to empathise with her joy and sorrow.

In order for the animated character to be seen to interact with live action actors and animals, the computer generated (CG) image had to be inserted into live action film plates. The CG artists have to perform the complex task of working out the exact geographical position from which each camera is placed, in order to insert the three dimensional character seamlessly into the frame. This is where boujou match moving software is essential to the post-production team.

Ben Warner, Visual Effects artist at Rising Sun Pictures, explained: “Part of the director’s vision for Charlotte was for her to be active and moving, meaning many of the plates we needed to add Charlotte to, were shot with moving cameras, either on jibs or tripods. The combination of a large number of moving camera shots, combined with tight timeframes meant we needed a solid tracking solution that we could use for both the easy tracking shots and the more difficult ones.”

Almost every sequence needed some amount of boujou tracking, the most heavily worked being the first scene in which the audience is introduced to Charlotte ? the camera moves are dynamic, random and fast-paced.

[Read the rest at CreativeMatch.co.uk]

All of your favorite characters will make an appearance, and the developers are making it so the player can – at one point or another – control all of them. They’ve said it would be “quick and simple,” exactly the way a good kid’s game should be, but at the same time, the title will feature some cool exploration and puzzle solving.

“Signing Charlott’e Web is a major coup for us and we’ll be maximizing the massive publicity that will surround the film launch. This release firmly places Blast! on the map as the leading value PS2 publisher across Europe and we plan to announce further high profile signings throughout 2007,” said Sean Brennan of Blast! Entertainment.

We very much like the idea of playing as the ol’ familiar characters in the book (Templeton the Rat, along with Wilbur and Charlotte should be fun), so Charlotte’s Web should prove to be a worthwhile game for fans of the novel and movie. The game is loosely scheduled for March in Europe, but there is no release date for North America yet.

[PSX Extreme]

The first of those titles is Charlotte’s Web: Word Rescue which was released in conjunction with Charlotte’s Web, the major motion picture from Nickelodeon Movies/Walden Media/Paramount Pictures. Other Nickelodeon and MTVN Kids and Family Group brands which MumboJumbo will publish and develop games, include Neopets, one of the world’s most popular youth websites; and Nickelodeon’s hit animated comedy/adventure series Avatar: The Last Airbender.

“We are excited to enter into a partnership with a company like MumboJumbo, one of the most trusted and well-respected publishers of family-friendly, casual games and online PC titles, and to continue to enhance Nickelodeon and MTVN Kids and Family Group’s casual gaming offerings,” said Paul Jelinek, Vice President of Digital Media Products for Nickelodeon and MTVN Kids & Family Group. “We’re excited to add branded content on some of our top properties to our audience’s casual gaming experience.”

“We are honored Nickelodeon and MTVN Kids and Family Group chose to work with MumboJumbo in creating games based on their great entertainment properties, starting initially with Charlotte’s Web,” said Paul Jensen, President of MumboJumbo. “Charlotte’s Web has been one of the most popular children’s stories of all times, and there’s no better way to extend your enjoyment of this tale through the engaging, fun-to-play word puzzle game of Charlotte’s Web: Word Rescue.”

Charlotte’s Web: Word Rescue brings to life the timelessly lovable characters of E.B. White’s story of loyalty and companionship in a creative and challenging word puzzle game. Gamers are charged with the mission of weaving letters, constructing words and solving phrases to help the web-crafty Charlotte spin her wise remarks into a netting masterpiece. When players crack the quotes, Wilbur the pig advances in his journey from the Zuckerman Farm to the County Fair, enlivening ten familiar Charlotte’s Web settings offered in either puzzle or timed mode.

Charlotte’s Web: Word Rescue will be made available through MumboJumbo’s extensive network of online game portals, including
MumboJumbo.com and on NickArcade.com. The Avatar and Neopets themed-games will be released in second quarter 2007 and dates will be announced in the coming months.

Grand Prize: HP 9000 Pavilion Notebook and a Yamaha RGX-A2 Electric Guitar signed by Jeremy Camp, Newsboys, Bart Millard, Jars of Clay, Nicole Nordeman, Smokey Norful, Chris Tomlin, Steven Curtis Chapman

Grand Prize #2: HP 9000 Pavilion Notebook

1st Prize (15): Amazing Grace prize pack (Limited Edition ‘Amazing Change’ t-shirt, cinch pack, frisbee)

2nd Prize (15): Charlotte’s Web prize pack (T-shirt, book, cinch pack, bracelets)

3rd Prize (25): 1 copy of ‘The Chronicles of Narnia Limited Edition’

How to Enter: Simply go to the Contest Page and Complete the Form