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>Mourning "Toy Story" Storyteller > >( * sob * -mmJun ) > >The story artist's blog might have said it all: "It is >the saddest day at Pixar." > >The production home of Toy Story and A Bug's Life was >in mourning following the death of Joe Ranft, a >leading creative force behind those two hit films and >more than a dozen other major animated releases since >the late 1980s. > >Ranft, a member of Toy Story's Oscar-nominated writing >team, and the voice of Wheezy the penguin in Toy Story >2 and Heimlich the caterpillar in A Bug's Life, was >killed Tuesday afternoon when the 2004 Honda Element >he was riding in veered off a California coastal >highway, and plunged 130 feet into the water below. He >was 45. > >The driver, a 32-year-old Elegba Earl of Los Angeles, >also was killed. A second passenger, a 39-year-old >Eric Frierson, survived with what were described as >"moderate" injuries. He managed to climb out through >the vehicle's moon roof. > >According to the Marin (California) Independent >Journal, Ranft and the two men had been on their way >to Mendocino, California, to take part in a retreat >for a mentoring organization. Ranft is survived by his >wife, Su, and two children, Jordy, 13, and Sophia 9. > >News of Ranft's death hit the animation community >hard. Easily, it hit hardest at Pixar, where Ranft had >spent the past decade-plus as head of story at its >animation studio, storyboarding, storytelling and >lending voices to everything from The Incredibles to >Finding Nemo (he was Jacques, the cleaner fish) to Toy >Story 2. > >"Joe was an important and beloved member of the Pixar >family," the company said in a statement. > >Director John Lasseter, Pixar's creative chief, hailed >Ranft's knack for stories. "He told them better than >anyone," Lasseter said in the Los Angeles Times. "He >was funny, poignant, original; and he had an >infallible sense for how to structure a story." > >A 1999 Salon.com profile described Ranft simply as "a >story man." > >Ranft told the Website that he loved how Pixar films >took shape in freewheeling story meetings. "I imagine >it's what it must have been like in the Mack Sennett >silent clown days, with a bunch of guys selling ideas, >then going off and making the movie," he said. > >Ranft's studio career began in 1980 with Disney. >There, he worked on the breakthrough films Who Framed >Roger Rabbit, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, >among others. > >At Pixar, he had a hand, or voice, in every one of its >hit features: Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2, >Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo and The Incredibles. >According to the Times, he supervised the story on >Pixar's latest, Cars, scheduled for summer 2006, and >rated an executive producer credit on Tim Burton's >Corpse Bride, a Warners release due out in September. > >Wrote Ronnie del Carmen, the blogging Pixar story >artist, in a tribute to Ranft: "Mighty big shoes." > >http://news.yahoo.com/s/eo/20050820/en_movies_eo/17194; >_ylt=Agi3GOfGBS7cL8qziK68c4kwFxkF;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9m >BHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl

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