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3 Basques contributed to computer-animated film 'Planet 51'

E.S.

06/18/2009

Elena Ortego, Julen Santiago and Iñigo Berasategi feel very proud of their work with Madrid's Ilion Animation Studios in a film that will be premiered in Christmas.

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As it happened in E.T.,&' || 'nbsp;Planet 51 tells the story of an intruder in a foreign land whose inhabitants live in fear of an alien invasion. To feed the paranoia, they receive the visit of Capt. Charles "Chuck" Baker, an astronaut who arrives from Earth. He will count on the help of a young native in order to recover his spaceship and return home.

Planet 51 was born in Ilion Animation Studios, an upstart film company in Madrid, Spain. With a 300-people-staff, the film managed to be distributed by the big-time distributor Sony. There were about 50 people working as animators, and eitb.com found that 3 of them were Basques.

Elena Ortego, Julen Santiago and Iñigo Berasategi, proud of their work with Madrid''s studios, told eitb.com that participating at the filmmaking was a huge challenge. After breaking the barrier of fear -they were aware of the fact that their colleagues were high-level workers- , they faced the project''s magnitude.

"We were like puppet handlers. We were responsible for the movement of the characters, and we did our best in order for the film to be as lively as possible," Santiago said. Her team member Elena is willing to see the film at the cinema. "After spending two years working on the movie, it will be a great prize for me to see it on a big screen," she exclaimed.

Planet 51 was written by Joe Stillman (Shrek). The film is produced by Ignacio Perez Dolset, directed by Jorge Blanco and co-directed by Javier Abad and Marcos Martinez. It will be premiered in Christmas.

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