An anti-pollution fable, The Lorax still ended up selling SUVs and diapers
Dr. Seuss wrote The Lorax in 1971 as a warning about greed and pollution. Illumination's 2012 film version signed more than 70 product tie-ins, including a Mazda SUV advert featuring its trees and characters. Critics were divided, but the movie took about $351 million on a $70 million budget.
The film expands Seuss's short book. Ted, a 12-year-old in the walled city of Thneedville where every plant is plastic, wants to find a real tree for his crush Audrey. His quest leads him outside to a poisoned wasteland and to the Once-ler, a reclusive former inventor who explains how he chopped down the Truffula forest to make knitted Thneeds despite the protests of the Lorax, the forest's self-appointed guardian. The town's mayor, O'Hare, sells bottled air and sees free oxygen from trees as a threat.
Seuss's widow, Audrey Geisel, started it. She had worked with producer Chris Meledandri on Horton Hears a Who! and told him this was the book she wanted next when he launched Illumination. Two characters carry family names: Ted after Theodor Geisel and Audrey after his wife. Chris Renaud directed, Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio wrote it, and the animation was made in France by Illumination Mac Guff. Danny DeVito voiced the Lorax and learned his lines phonetically to perform the role in several foreign-language dubs as well.
Commercial deals caused the loudest arguments. Some saw the Mazda CX-5 campaign as the reverse of Seuss's message; Universal's licensing chief replied that the car was a greener option for buyers who could not afford a hybrid or electric vehicle. Tie-ins also reached disposable diapers, IHOP, Whole Foods and the Environmental Protection Agency. After a fourth-grade class in Brookline, Massachusetts, petitioned online, Universal added an environmental message to the film's website.
Opening on March 2, 2012, it took $70.2 million over its first weekend, a record for a Seuss adaptation and for Illumination at the time, and stayed on top the next week. It was also the first release to carry Universal's new centenary logo. Reviews averaged mixed, with some arguing Hollywood formulas diluted the book's simple moral, while CinemaScore audiences gave it an A.
Source: The Lorax (film)
