The blink-and-you-miss-them film references in 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish'

The DNA of "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" is less 16th-century Italian fairy tale than it is 20th-century Sergio Leone and Akira Kurosawa. Several shots in the animated sequel are directly inspired by some of those masters' most famous images. It's all part of how the "Puss" filmmakers used cinematic foreshadowing to convey that "characters chasing the future are oblivious to what's right in front of them," director Joel Crawford says.

"When I saw a Sergio Leone spaghetti Western for the first time, it was the closest thing to a superhero movie for me," he says. "Everything's so dramatic and cool; it made it