Lilo and Stitch
Warm, funny, and imaginative, Lilo & Stitch is the best
animated feature the Walt Disney Studios have produced in years.
On the planet Turo, mad scientist Jumba Jookiba (voice by David
Ogden Stiers) has created a miniature monster programmed for
destruction. When the monster escapes to Earth, it's adopted as a
pet and named "Stitch" by Lilo (Daveigh Chase), a lonely
little Hawaiian girl. Lilo and her older sister Nani (Tia Carrere)
have been struggling to stay together since their parents died.
Stitch and Lilo share some hilarious adventures, evading welfare
officer Cobra Bubbles (Ving Rhames) and galactic police agents.
They learn the timely lesson that a family can be something you're
born into--or something you assemble. A warmth and sincerity that
recall The Iron Giant and the films of Hiyao Miyazaki make Lilo a
delightful fantasy adults and children can truly enjoy together.
The tale of a young girl's encounter with the galaxy's most wanted
extraterrestrial. Lilo is a lonely Hawaiian girl who adopts a
small ugly 'dog', whom she names Stitch. Stitch would be the
perfect pet if he wasn't a genetic experiment that escaped from an
alien planet and crash-landed on earth. Through her faith and
unwavering belief in "ohana" (the Hawaiian concept of
family), Lilo helps unlock Stitch's heart and gives him the one
thing he wasn't designed to have--the ability to love.
Click here
to download the Lilo
and Stitch
movie script.
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The
Cast
Lilo - Daveigh Chase
Stitch - Christopher Michael Sanders
Nani - Tia Carrere
Jumba - David Ogden Stiers
Pleakley - Kevin McDonald
Cobra Bubbles - Ving Rhames
Grand Council Woman - Zoe Caldwell
David Kawena - Jason Scott Lee
Captain Gantu - Kevin Michael Richardson
Rescue Lady - Susan Hegarty
Mrs. Hasagawa - Amy Hill
Hula Teacher - Kunewa Mook
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Facts
The teaser trailers for this film parody trailers for other recent
Disney films such as Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid,
Aladdin, and The Lion King (two of these were animated by
Sanders). They begin like actual scenes from the movies they
parody, until Stitch comes in and disrupts the action. These are
called "Inter-Stitch-als" and are featured on the
official site.
The entire film is full of parodies and references to other films
and other visual creations. These references reach their zenith at
the very end where snapshots of the future "family" life
of Stitch with Lilo and the others are presented, with each of the
still pictures being variations of classic images like famous
Norman Rockwell illustrations.
The scenes featuring aliens in space are strikingly similar to
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. The government in The
Phantom Menace is called the Galactic Republic, and the government
in Lilo & Stitch is called the Galactic Federation. The word
"hyperspace" is even used at one point in the film. The
grand councilwoman is similar in physique and attire to the
Neimoidians of Episode I as well.
Many features are also close to that of the Star Trek universe. In
Star Trek, the protagonists work for "the Federation",
an interstellar and interspecies government which, like the
Galactic federation of Lilo and Stitch, has an important
bureaucratic and legalistic bent. In the two imaginary universes,
starship captains are important figures and can often be
antagonists when they turn bad, like Captain Gantu.
In the tradition of Star Wars and the alien civilizations of Star
Trek, alien writing is in a fictional script (except the newspaper
Jumba reads after he is arrested). We hear all the aliens except
Stitch speaking the same language as the humans do. Jumba's speech
patterns sounds like a Russian accent, similar to Bullwinkle's
nemesis Boris Badenov.
Social Worker Cobra Bubbles, formerly of the CIA, is obviously one
of the mysterious "Men in Black" (of urban legends and a
couple of hit movies) who work to prevent an alien takeover of
Earth and to persuade humans that aliens do not exist.
Some of the aliens on the Federation spaceship bear resemblances
to classic Disney characters, including Piglet and Tigger from the
Winnie the Pooh series of films and television programs. Agent
Pleakley appears to have been patterned after the walking brooms
from the Fantasia sequence, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice."
In the backgrounds of both Lilo and Nani's rooms are references to
Disney movies. Lilo has a stuffed Dumbo doll on her art easel
while Nani has a movie poster for Mulan in her room. In addition
to this, during the scene where Stitch sees the black and white
footage of a spider destroying a city in a shop-window television,
the establishing shot includes a restaurant called "Mulan
Wok."
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Trivia
1. Stitch is featured as a summon character in Kingdom Hearts II,
appearing in Hollow Bastion and participates in the war scene.
2. This film was originally scheduled for 2003.
3. Disney Adventures originally ran comics predating the movie,
and gave a little information on Lilo's character and Stitch's
history.
4. Mertle Edmonds was either mistakenly called Jenny or renamed
from Jenny during the film's production.
5. Experiment 625 was exactly in the comics as he was in the
series, with the exception the fur color. This may have been
because the Lilo and Stitch series was planned, but it is more
likely that the character was pulled into the TV series once it
was put into production.
6. In the comics, the experiments were completely harmless and
beared little/no resemblance to Stitch. This was changed to add a
good plot to the series.
7. In comics created after the series, new experiments were added
but not numbered to lessen the chance of continuity mistakes.
8. The original plan for the ending of Lilo & Stitch was
completely changed due to the September 11, 2001 attacks. The
original ending featured Stitch stealing a 747 then joyriding
among the office and hotel towers of Honolulu; the revised ending
uses a spaceship racing through clouds and through a tight valley
with Dr. Jumba (the gradually friendlier mad scientist) at the
controls while Stitch steals a full tanker truck and joyrides it
down the crater of a volcano. This original un-edited version is
set to be included on the upcoming special edition DVD release.
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Movie
Mistakes
1. After the explosion of Lilo's house, her picture of her family
is burned on the top right and bottom left sides. in later shots,
the picture is burned on the top left and bottom right. It
switches back and forth many times.
2. When Nani is trying to drag Stitch out of the house, he
scratches the door frame. These scratches disappear and reappear
throughout the movie.
3. When Lilo is taken away by the Captain Stitch scratches the
tube. The markings he made disappear and reappear repeatedly.
4. After their surf-adventure, in the scene where Nani and Lilo
are sitting and singing in the hammock, there are two torches
which keeps appearing and disappearing.
5. In the Hula lesson at the beginning of the film the two men in
the corner seem to be tapping yellow drums shaped like bowling
pins, yet when Lilo makes her comment about Pudge the fish
controlling the weather it cuts to the men for a reaction and the
one on the right appears to be holding a large red normal shaped
drum.
6. In the scene where Lilo is in her bedroom, and Nani brings her up a slice of pizza, Lilo wants to tell her a story. So she sets her doll down on the bed, and it appears to be right in front of the pillow. Then the shot changes, and the doll is down past Lilo's legs, closer to the wall.
7. When Nani, Stitch and Lilo are at home passing from stairs to entrance, you can see the light switch close to the book shelf. When they reach the entrance, the light switch has gone.
8. In the dance school scene, the older girls are wearing some type of calf length white pants under the grass skirts. When the fight between Lilo and the red haired girl breaks out, the older girls no longer have the pants at all.
9. In the scene where Lilo shows Stitch her bedroom for the first time, we see a hula girl lamp on her bedside table, then when Stitch is on the floor across the room, building "San
Francisco" out of books and toys he reaches over and drags the lamp toward him as if it had been on the floor beside him. Moments later the lamp is back on the table, and the mess is
gone.
10. In the scene where Stitch messes with the blender, the stuff shoots out all over the place but there's no mess.
11. After Stitch regurgitates the cake and replaces it on the plate, when he smells the bait and hops off the chair, the plate with the slice of cake has vanished.
12. The door next to the white cabinet/dryer that Lilo hides in is hinged on the frame further away from the cabinet/dryer, which is visible when Nani opens then closes the door to trick Lilo into thinking she has left. However in the scene where Jumba and Pleakley are in the house, going after Stitch, Lilo opens the same door, however it has swapped to being hinged on the frame next to the cabinet/dryer.
13. In the scene where Nani is buying Stitch, the woman says "There's a two-dollar
license fee...", on the green wall there is a big large empty space. Then when it cuts to a wideview, after the paper is stamped, a big black telephone is hanging on the
previously bare wall!
14. In the beginning of the movie, a few seconds after Lilo attacks Myrtle, all the girls, including Myrtle, gather behind the director. Myrtle's bracelet of leaves is still on. Then when it cuts to her, Myrtle says, "Ew, she bit me." and the bracelet is gone.
15. In one shot of Lilo in the spaceship near the end of the movie, her family picture disappears.
16. At one point during "He Mele No Lilo", the two older Hula dancers at the left switch places, after that they switch back to their original places.
17. When Nani brings Mr. Bubbles into her home, she spots the paper on the fridge that says "Home Alone," and she runs over to hide it. In this shot you can see that the top of the fridge is empty. Then in the next shot a green towel is hanging down off the top.
18. When Nani is trying to get through the dogflap, Mr. Bubbles pulls her out. In a closer view of Nani when she gets pulled out, Lilo's blue sandals sit by the door. In the following wideshot they've gone.
19. When Pleakly and Jumba have captured Stitch, Pleakly calls in to report that their mission is accomplished and adds that they will be waiting for someone to pick them up. Later Jumba shows Nani where their space ship was hidden. Why would they need to be picked up if they had their space ship waiting?
20. After Stitch finds Lilo's photo, he runs across the bed and then Lilo follows him, and you can see the yellow bedsheet covered in stars and moons and planets etc. is pulled up neatly on the bed. However after Stitch messes some stuff around, they return to the bed and now the yellow sheet is mysteriously hanging untidily over the foot of the bed.
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The
Setting
The movie was originally intended to take place in rural Kansas,
so that Stitch could interact with other characters while still
being isolated from wreaking greater havoc. A decision to change
the film's setting to the Hawaiian island of Kauai was an
important choice in defining the plot more clearly. No other
feature-length animated movie had ever taken place on any of the
Hawaiian islands before. In Sanders's words: "Animation
has been set so much in ancient, medieval Europe—so many fairy
tales find their roots there, that to place it in Hawaii was kind
of a big leap. But that choice went to color the entire movie, and
rewrite the story for us."
While the animation team visited Kauai to research the locale,
their tour guide explained the meaning of ohana as it applies to
extended families. This concept of ohana became an important part
of the movie. DeBlois recalls: "No matter where we went, our
tour guide seemed to know somebody. He was really the one who
explained to us the Hawaiian concept of ohana, a sense of family
that extends far beyond your immediate relatives. That idea so
influenced the story that it became the foundation theme, the
thing that causes Stitch to evolve despite what he was created to
do, which is destroy."
The island of Kauai had previously been featured in such films as
Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Jurassic Park trilogy. The Disney
animators faced the daunting task of meshing the film's plot,
which showed the impoverished and dysfunctional life that many
Hawaiians and other Westerners lived during the recent economic
downturn, with the island's serene beauty. The hula sequence in
Lilo & Stitch plays a key role in establishing the movie's
Hawaiian setting.
To give a brighter image to the film, the studio used watercolors
to paint the backgrounds. This technique had not been used since
Dumbo in 1941. Due to the production schedules, which have
continuously tightened since Dumbo, watercolors were risky; one
wrong stroke could ruin a piece, and with some 1,200 backgrounds
for this movie, there was no time available to waste. Opaque
gouache and acrylic paint, the current industry standards, are
much more forgiving than watercolor because they let an artist
paint over his mistakes. Using watercolors, the Disney artists had
to carefully plan a background before they began working on it so
as to avoid mistakes. Sanders and the studio's Backgrounds
Department searched for easier ways to get the bright look, but
finally decided that traditional watercolors were the proper way
to go, and had the Orlando crew trained in the technique.
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