The Aristocats

[osprey_archer]

Forging ahead with the Disney rewatch! I've found this to be quite a good time for rewatching things; there's something very soothing about re-experiencing a story I already know - even if only vaguely, as with The Aristocats. We didn't have this one on VHS when I was a child, so I've only seen it once.

I quite enjoyed it! Thomas O'Malley the alley cat (who inexplicably lives in the French countryside) is a classic Disney hero type, the scrappy street smart guy with a heart of gold and a lot of swagger (Robin Hood, next on our list, is probably the moment when this character type reaches its apotheosis.) It was also pleasant to visit animated Paris (we giggled when the cats just happened to run past Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower - reminiscent of the way the kids in Peter Pan perch on the hands of Big Ben), and of course the kittens are super cute.

I also really enjoyed the old people - Madam herself, and also her lawyer. One thing I've really noticed this time around is how many Disney movies have delightful secondary characters, most of whom I didn't really pay attention to when I was a kid, because I was so focused on the child characters. (Whenever we see something I watched a lot as a child, I always remember my favorite character, and it's usually the smallest child character.) Now I'm paying attention to the adult characters, too, and it's adding a whole new layer to my appreciation of the movies.

Comments

[kore]

I think A LOT of people mix it up with the Aristocats, because "musical - animated - cats- go to Paris -- " I saw it when I was a preteen on a weekend afternoon movie rerun (LOL, that sounds like Czarist Russia now) and didn't catch the name, and spent years afterward looking for it until a friend finally googled it for me in the early 00s. If I'd been able to remember Judy Garland was in it, I could have found it a lot earlier!