Mexican animated film to begin showing in U.S.

Mexican film production company Huevocartoon aspires to make it big at the U.S. box office with “Un gallo con muchos huevos” (A Rooster with Many Eggs), a 3D animated lowbudget film in Spanish whose success could alter the prevailing paradigm in Hollywood’s animated film industry.

The film was made exclusively in Mexico, albeit using international talent, including a veteran of DreamWorks, and it cost just $5 million and required four years of work.

The result is a fulllength feature that has been No. 1 in Mexican theaters for two weekends, pulling in almost $6 million, and it will now take the plunge into the U.S. market this coming Friday, for the Labor Day weekend, expecting the Latino public to receive it with open arms.

“Un gallo con muchos huevos” is the third in a farm trilogy that began in 2006 with “Una pelicula de huevos” (A Film About Eggs) followed in 2009 by “Otra pelicula de huevos y un pollo” (Another Film About Eggs and a Chicken) although neither of these two works ever made it to U.S. movie screens.

The use of double entendre, dealing with death and racial concepts were some of the elements that stymied the debut of the first two parts of the “eggs” trilogy in the United States, but the filmmakers learned from their mistakes and now have managed to crack the lucrative U.S. market.

“We’ve thought a lot about the international audience,” said Rodolfo Riva Palacio, who along with his brother Gabriel heads Huevocartoon and is the moving force behind the trilogy, in which the rooster Toto must now become a “fighting cock” to save the farm and all his chickenandegg pals.

“We made many U.S. references to try to get closer to the culture. Its structure is like ‘The Karate Kid,’ it has elements of ‘Rocky,’ ‘The Terminator,’ ‘The Godfather,’” Rodolfo Riva said, going on to cite the influence of JeanClaude Van Damme, Chuck Norris and Bruce Lee on the film.

“It’s a universal story: fight for your dreams, believe in yourself, overcome your fears,” the producer added, going on to say that the film has “enough regional elements to give it a unique identity.”

The film is being distributed by Pantelion Films, which focuses on productions for the Hispanic audience and enjoyed its greatest success with “No se aceptan devoluciones” (Instructions Not Included, 2013) directed by Eugenio Derbez.

That film earned more than $44 million at U.S. theaters and almost $100 million worldwide, figures far beyond the average income for Pantelion films, which generally bring in about $5 million.

“Un gallo con muchos huevos” will be shown in Spanish with English subtitles for the first two weeks of its U.S. run, but from then on it will be fully dubbed in English.

“Everything points to the fact that things are going to go well,” said the producer, who lives in the United States, where his brother will also settle soon, and together they will create the U.S. division of Huevocartoon to “bring dollars to Mexico.”

The Riva Palacio brothers are convinced that the formula for producing animated works in Mexico for distribution in this country is not only viable, but will also be very profitable.

“Making the same film in the U.S. would have cost 10 times more. It’s a great business opportunity,” Rodolfo Riva said.