Looking forward to Chimpanzee tomorrow, 4/20/12!!

News & Features

Disneynature’s Chimpanzee Swings Into Theaters on April 20

04.17.12 – Disneynature’s Chimpanzee tells the amazing story of an orphan ape named Oscar and his unlikely foster parent.

"We had all fallen in love with little Oscar," Alastair Fothergill, the critically acclaimed director who brought us Disneynature's African Cats and Earth, says. "So it was incredibly painful to see him so alone and helpless."

Some laws are made to be broken, and one of them is the Law of the Jungle—as proven by the miraculous relationship that forms between Oscar, a young, vulnerable chimpanzee, and Freddy, a ruling alpha male, in Disneynature’s Chimpanzee, swinging into theaters on April 20.
Narrated by Tim Allen, the film begins with a light, playful romp in a visually stunning forest. But the “nature” part kicks in when a rival group of chimpanzees attacks, and Oscar is separated from his mother. It looks like curtains for the little chimp. “We had all fallen in love with little Oscar,” Alastair Fothergill, the critically acclaimed director who brought us Disneynature’s African Cats and Earth, says. “So it was incredibly painful to see him so alone and helpless. In the back of our minds, we were also thinking we might have to call Disney and say, ‘Thanks guys, we haven’t got a movie.’” And that’s when a guardian angel—in the form of a top-ranking male chimpanzee—takes Oscar under his wing.

"It was just amazing and very touching to see this big, normally gruff male pour his love and devotion into caring for Oscar," says Mark Linfield, who co-directed the film with Alastair Fothergill.

“It was just amazing and very touching to see this big, normally gruff male pour his love and devotion into caring for Oscar,” says Mark Linfield, who co-directed the film with Fothergill. Freddy lets Oscar climb aboard his back and the patriarch carries the young chimpanzee through the rainforest just as his mother had once done. “The adoption of an infant by an adult alpha male has never been filmed like this,” adds Dr. Jane Goodall, one of the world’s foremost conservationists and an authority on chimpanzee behavior.
The film follows Oscar as he learns the ropes of cracking nuts, grooming, and finding his place in the complex social scene of his chimpanzee group. “One of the big things is the sheer inaccessibility of the Taï Forest,” Fothergill says about the complexities of filming in such a remote location. “To get there you drive 10 hours from the nearest city on what’s still a tarmac road. Then you do another four hours on a dirt road that is sometimes impassable. And, if you make it that far, there’s an hour or more of walking along a very narrow path into the forest.”

Director Mark Linfield, principal photographer Bill Wallauer, and camera assistant Ed Anderson focus on the chimps.

Dr. Goodall is also impressed with the footage that Fothergill, Linfield, and their crew captured in the Taï Forest. “I thought the film was wonderful, especially knowing something about the conditions under which it was made,” she says. “I’m filled with admiration for the people who made it. It’s got drama, it’s got a story, it’s got sadness, and it’s got a lot of humor.”
For every moviegoer who sees Chimpanzee during the film’s opening week (April 20-26), Disneynature will make a donation to the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) through the Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund to protect chimpanzees today and tomorrow.

By D23′s Billy Stanek