The jewel of Albert Whitman's crown, the Boxcar Children series by Gertrude Chandler Warner, is being released today as an animated feature-length film, distributed by Phase 4 in Toronto, Canada. Roughly a dozen theaters around the country will screen the film, including one in Park Ridge, Ill., home to Albert Whitman's offices. (You can watch the trailer here.)
All four of the voice actors from the movie are scheduled to attend the Park Ridge screening and will remain afterward for a q&a session with the directors, Dan Chuba and Mark Dippé of Hammerhead Productions. The actors are Joey King (currently in Wish I Was Here and the Fargo series on FX), Zachary Gordon (Greg Heffley from the Wimpy Kid movies), Mackenzie Foy (Renesmee from Twilight: Breaking Dawn 1&2) and Jadon Sand (Finn from LEGO: The Movie). The movie will be released on DVD at the same time.
"The Boxcar Children was intended to be a straight-to-DVD production," said Mike Spradlin, Albert Whitman's director of sales and marketing, "and once it got a debut at the Toronto Film Festival, it got good reviews and good buzz, and they've been able to get theatrical release for it in 12 theaters."
Director Dan Chuba's company started out as a visual arts production company, according to Spradlin, and did the visual effects for a variety of films such as X-men, Prometheus and The Fast and Furious franchise. The Boxcar Children marks his directorial debut. "It struck me that he had these blockbusters and he wanted to make this sweet little animated film," Spradlin said. "He was able to bring in some real talent to the production. All of them are proud of the movie and have agreed to help us promote it, schedule permitting."
The Boxcar Children series has sold 60 million copies, but this is its first time in a film incarnation. "We think it will bring new awareness to the series," Spradlin said. "We have nearly 50,000 Facebook fans on the Boxcar Children Facebook page. We have everything from grandparents to parents to children following us."
Spradlin said they're sticking with the original covers for the books, which is what most of their accounts requested. This fall, Whitman will release The Boxcar Children Guide to Adventure--how to make a disguise, how to solve a crime, how to go on a hiking trail and find your path--as well as two new mysteries: The Mystery of the Soccer Snitch and (#137!) The Mystery of the Grinning Gargoyle, in which the children visit their grandfather's alma mater.
Offering personal testimony to the books' staying power, Spradlin recalled that when his own children were in second grade, and "cracked the reading code, the Boxcar Children is the series they went to." His son is 28 now, but when Spradlin told him about the film, "he said there's something about these kids living in a boxcar in the woods and making it on their own. When they get to that age, second grade, they want to do everything by themselves. The sense of independence that these kids have really speaks to children. At the end they have the safety net of the grandfather, giving them a sense of security."
The screening is free with the donation of a book. Albert Whitman is working with local libraries and Open Books Chicago to get the word out. There'll be Boxcar Children trivia, and treat bags for all attendees. "What I'm most excited about is the charity aspect of it and working with a partner like Open Books that does such wonderful things in our community. It's just a fantastic way for us to help launch the film," Spradlin said.