The Walt Disney Company has officially pulled out of an as-yet-untitled stop-motion animated feature film directed by Henry Selick that was slated to debut in the fall of 2013.  Selick is a stop-motion maestro whose credits include Coraline, James and the Giant Peach, and The Nightmare Before Christmas and his films have attracted a devoted cult following.  Selick is now free to shop the project, which he described as a "medium-dark" fantasy, to another studio, though the film’s production will undoubtedly be delayed.

 

Selick’s stop-motion epic is the first project cancelled by Disney’s new studio boss Alan Horn, who took over from Rich Ross in June.  According to Variety, the cancellation does not affect Selick’s adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book, which is also set up at Disney (see "Disney Grabs Gaiman's 'The Graveyard Book'").