The Rescuers

The Rescuers

Directors: John Lounsbery, Wolfgang Reitherman, Art Stevens . Cast: Bob Newhart, Eva Gabor, Geraldine Page 

I’ve always had very fond memories of this one. I remember watching it in the cinema when it was first released in ’77 and taking my little brother to watch it again in ’83 when it was re-released (accompanied by one of my ultimate favourite short “Mickey’s Christmas Carol”). Back then it was Disney’s first box office success in over 10 years (and it would be another 12 before the next big hit with “The Little Mermaid”) and interestingly it would be the first animated feature to have a sequel in the early 90s.Today it still considered as a (minor) classic, mainly for the lovely characterizations and expressiveness of the two mice-leads, the arrays of secondary characters (the albatross Orvel, and dragonfly Evinrude among the best), one of Disney’s scariest baddie (Medusa, a cardbon copy of Cruela De Vil, in fact in an easlier draft of the film Cruela herself was meant to be the in it) and while It may not be on the same league of those big early classic, its simple and effective story-telling, the edge-of-your seat thrills and the humour that infuse the whole film make it very pleasant one. The animation itself is a bit up and down (this was a time when they were trying to save money), some of the sequences are beautifully drawn and the backgrounds with their pastel palette are very moody and beautiful, but clearly the animators took often some shortcuts and some of the sequences are slightly rougher. The songs, performed by Shelby Flint are also fairly forgettable and definitely not up to the levels of the old (or new for that matter) classics. But hey, who cares about all that. Watching it tonight as a family, we enjoyed it immensely, my son loved it and was on the edge of the sofa. A big winner in the house.

Finally, a little bit of a trivia footnote. The film became also famous (or infamous) for 2 frames where you could see a topless woman from a window (google it if you don’t believe me ).

On Disney +