The Trumpet of the Swan (film)

Infobox Film
name = The Trumpet of the Swan


caption = Theatrical release poster
director = Richard Rich
Terry L. Noss
producer =
writer = Judy Rothman Rofé
E.B. White
narrator =
starring = Reese Witherspoon
Jason Alexander
Seth Green
Carol Burnett
Mary Steenburgen
music =
cinematography =
editing =
distributor = TriStar Pictures
released = May 11, 2001 (limited)
runtime = 75 minutes
country = America
language = English
budget =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
website =
amg_id =
imdb_id = 0206367

"The Trumpet of the Swan" is a 2001 animated film produced by RichCrest Animation Studios, directed by Richard Rich, and distributed by TriStar Pictures, being TriStar's first animated film ever since 1988's "Pound Puppies and the Legend of Big Paw". It is loosely based on the popular children's book by E. B. White. It tells the story of a young Trumpeter Swan who is born without a voice and is vying for the attention of a beautiful pen named Serena. He overcomes this by learning to play the trumpet. It stars the voices of Reese Witherspoon, Jason Alexander, Seth Green, Carol Burnett, Joe Mantegna and Mary Steenburgen.

It was not well received by critics. Many stated the animation was poor, that the charm of the original book was lost, the characters were dull, the casting did not match, the songs were unmemorable and that the character design was awful. But the most common criticism of the film version was that it did not follow the original story well. This disappointed many fans of the book. On Rotten Tomatoes, it scored 13% rotten on the tomato-meter. It failed to get an audience at the box office, for two reasons, A small limited release, and the release of the "Shrek" the following week would cause the film to lose most of its audience.

In 2001, it was nominated by the Casting Society of America for best voice-casting in an animated film, but lost the award to Disney-backed "The Emperor's New Groove". It is notable, however, that an independent animated film would be able to win such a nomination. It was the last film based on a book by E. B. White until 2006's "Charlotte's Web".

External links

*imdb title|id=0206367|title=The Trumpet of the Swan
*rotten-tomatoes|id=trumpet_of_the_swan|title=The Trumpet of the Swan