The Animated Feature Film Company

The Animated Feature Film Company (formerly Lantz/Berman Productions and Walter Lantz Films) was a defunct American animated film production company that existed from 1950 to 1976, initially as a sister studio to the short form company Walter Lantz Productions, the first animation division of the film studio Universal Pictures. Some of the staff members however later go on to join Michael Wildshill Productions, while some of the members joined Wide Slope Animation.

Background
In 1941, after hearing the success of Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs movie, Universal's first animation studio Walter Lantz Productions wanted to get into feature animation by having their first feature film called Aladdin and His Lamp, based on the famous tales of Aladdin. It was set to star the voices of the comedy duo Abbott and Costello. However, after hearing that one of their rivals Fleischer Studios' film Mr. Bug Goes to Town failed at the box office, Aladdin never made it to actual production. In the late 1940s, Walter Lantz attempted to do a feature film again, but it never came to fruition.

History
In 1950, Glenn Berman announced that he will exit the military business after seeing the Walt Disney animated film Cinderella. Glenn had a positive reaction to one of Walter Lantz's animated sequences in the George Pal movie Destination Moon. Impressed by these success, Glenn met Walter Lantz to set up a feature film production company to compete with Disney. Whereas Lantz relies on animated feature shorts like the Woody Woodpecker series, Glenn said that they will do feature films only, and not short films. Universal-International Pictures then spent $10 million dollars to distribute these films.

The first film was an adaptation of the Scottish fairy tale The Light Princess was released on September 7, 1956, and it featured the voices of Rock Hudson, Grace Kelly, Daws Butler and Tab Hunter, it recieved critical and commercial acclaim, paving the way in order to establish Universal-International as a competitor to Disney, and gave the world to dub The Snow Queen on November 20, 1959. It grossed $7.5 million in distribution rentals over a $3 million budget.

The next film The Goose-Girl at the Well was released on June 3, 1960, and received the same acclaim the duo's previous film The Light Princess did, and featured the voices of Charlton Heston, Bob Hope and Beverly Garland, and grossed $8.5 million in distribution rentals over a $2.5 million budget.

In 1963, Lantz/Berman released its adaptation of the fairy tale Geirlug The King's Daughter, which was followed in 1966 by The Princess on the Glass Hill, and all of them were offered to distribution by Universal Pictures, shortly after it bought out by the new owners of the company MCA. Both of them received critical and commercial acclaim.

In 1968, Glenn Berman died from a cancer stroke. Shortly after his death, the film production company was renamed to Walter Lantz Films. In 1970, they released an adaptation of the 1961 Eloise Jarvis McGraw novel The Golden Goblet, which was released by Universal Pictures and it received $20 million in distribution rentals over a $7.5 million budget.

In 1972, after his last short "Bye, Bye Blackboard" was completed, Lantz left the company and hired Tony Johnson and Mark Berman, who were principal animators to became the head of animation and it was renamed to The Animated Feature Film Company. The last two films were released under the name, The Black Pearl, based on the novel was Scott O'Dell was released in 1974, followed by the film adaptation of the 1968 novel When Jays Fly to Barbmo in 1976.

In 1976, it was reported that head of animation Mark Berman would shut down the studio, ending the operations after the financial failure of the last film. Several of the animators joined Wide Slope Animation to do the animation for Serene and Topia, while many other animators joined Michael Wildshill Productions to do The Master of Colors.

Filmography
All of the below films below were distributed by Universal Pictures.