Paul McCartney will be featured alongside his Beatles bandmate Ringo Starr and some other major music luminaries in the upcoming 3D animated film High in the Clouds. The long-in-the-works movie is based on a 2005 children’s adventure book of the same name that McCartney co-wrote.
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McCartney and Starr are part of the just-announced voice cast of the flick, which is scheduled to premiere in 2027. Celine Dion and Lionel Richie also will be featured High in the Clouds, along with Himesh Patel, Hannah Waddingham, Idris Elba, Jimmy Fallon, and others.
According to an official synopsis, High in the Clouds is “an irresistible tale about the power of family and freedom of expression through music.” The film is set in an imaginary world populated by animal characters. The story focuses on a teenage squirrel named Wirral, who accidentally incited a revolution against a bossy diva owl named Gretsch, who has banned all music from the town where they live. Wirral then proceeds on a quest to “set music free.”
Patel, who starred in the 2019 Beatles-themed fantasy/comedy Yesterday, will voice Wirral. Dion will portray Wirral’s mother, Sugartail, while Ted Lasso co-star Waddingham will voice Gretsch.
McCartney, Starr, and Richie will lend their voices to the respective characters McKenzie, Roy, and Gladstone.
McCartney is contributing original songs to the film, which is being scored by Academy Award-winning composer Michael Giacchino. Giacchino won an Oscar for Up, and he also composed the scores for Ratatouille, Inside Out, and Coco. An original soundtrack for High in the Clouds is slated to be released by Universal Music Group.
More About the High in the Clouds Film
As previously reported, High in the Clouds is being directed by Toby Genkel, whose credits include The Amazing Maurice. Writer Jon Croker is penning the screenplay. McCartney and the French film company Gaumont are among the project’s producers.
The movie has already been sold to distributors in many major territories, including the U.K., Germany, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Greece, Portugal, Israel, and the Baltics.
In 2019, it was announced that a High in the Clouds film was being produced to air on Netflix. At one point the movie was scheduled for a 2023 release. However, it was reported in June 2024 that Netflix was no longer attached to the project.
The High in the Clouds book was co-written by McCartney and children’s author Philip Ardagh, with illustrations by Geoff Dunbar.
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