With ears pricked and his nose to the ground the stocky brown dog leads the way through the tall grass. An excited Ma Jess, Pezulu the cock and Polly the posh French poodle are hot on his heels.
It’s Jock, South Africa’s most famous Staffordshire terrier, and he’s back on the screen. And this time we will see Jock of the Bushveld’s adventures in 3D animation – in the first fully fledged 3D movie made in South Africa.
This first for the local film industry is the brainchild of Duncan MacNeillie, who wrote the screenplay for the original blockbuster Jock movie 24 years ago.
Come the December holidays when children’s movies are released in cinemas countrywide it no doubt will take pride of place, especially as it boasts a soundtrack involving no lesser talents than legendary Sir Tim Rice of The Lion King fame and popular Zulu warrior singer Johnny Clegg.
Speaking at his Johannesburg studio Duncan says he had always thought Jock would work exceptionally well in animation but didn’t do anything about it – until three years ago when he decided the time was ripe.
But just when all the painfully precise work an animation film demands was coming together 3D swept the movie industry like a tsunami, upsetting all his plans.
Duncan was also swept along by the 3D frenzy and decided to turn his new Jock movie into 3D. But this meant each scene had to be shot from scratch.
The new Jock of the Bushveld will be a more contemporary version of the original story and this time Jock’s friends are mostly animals, Duncan says.
The story is based on the adventures of a real dog. The Staffie first achieved fame in 1907 when his master, Sir Percy FitzPatrick, wrote a book about his adventures with his dog.
Like the book and the first movie the new animated film is set in the 1880s.
* Read how Jock was made into a 3D flick in YOU, 19 April 2010.