Klaus

The other animated feature soon to be released (the one that isn't Frozen 2) is an original from the creator of Despicable Me, centering on Old Saint Nick.

The piece is written and directed by Sergio Pablos, and Sergio P. is like 82.4% of everyone who's ever worked in cartoon features: he's got a Disney pedigree. In Mr. Pablos case, he was an animator on The Goofy Movie, Tarzan and other Disney projects that passed through Disney's Paris studio. A couple of years back, he pitched his Santa story to Netflix, and they shelled out some cash and told him to go make it.

And they were cool with Sergio P. doing the film as a hand-drawn feature, which is, frankly, astounding.

The flick comes out on November 8th, and gets released digitally a week later. I assume without knowing that because Netflix isn't overly concerned about running up big numbers at your neighborhood multiplex, the hand-drawn format wasn't an issue. I hope the picture does brisk business, but I won't be surprised if it doesn't. However, the feature looks outstanding.