Written by Ken Anderson, Larry Clemmons, Eric Cleworth et al.
Directed by Wolfgang Reitherman
USA, 1970
The 1970s and early 1980s represent a curious episode in the history of Walt Disney Animation Studios’ features. The famous studio rarely produces outright poor movies, yet this period is just as rarely mentioned in the same breath as its first decade or so, when classics like Pinocchio, Bambi, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs came to be, or the baptized renaissance that began with The Little Mermaid and lasted until Tarzan. It feels as though the aforementioned decade and a half feature a steady stream of decent, generally appreciated outings but nothing most people cite as being their favourite efforts. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, The Rescuers, The Fox and the Hound, Robin Hood; few if any of these make anyone’s top 5 lists. Neither does the film that opened the 1970s, the comical, easygoing romp The Aristocats.
Set in France in 1910, the story opens with retired diva Madame Adelaide de Bonfamille returning from an errand to her majestic Parisian mansion. Driving her cart is butler Edgar Balthazar (voice of Roddy Maude-Roxby) and accompanying her are the things she holds most dear: her cats. There is the mother Duchess (Eva Gabor, who also voices Miss Bianca in The Rescuers and its 1990 sequel) and her kittens Marie (Liz English), Toulouse (Gary Dublin) and Berlioz (Dean Clark). In such high esteem does Madame de Bonfamille revere her pets that upon dictating the terms of her will to her lawyer, she explains that, given the absence of any family members, all her riches must be bequeathed to the cats after her passing. Only once the animals pass away will Edgar benefit. The butler, eavesdropping on the conversation, is enraged by this ridiculous order and that same night kidnaps the quartet of felines, drives off to the countryside with his scooter, and leaves them for dead. Lost and scared, Duchess and her younglings will need to depend on a vagabond alley cat named Thomas O’Malley (Phil Harris) to lead them back home.
The Aristocats fits in perfectly well with this oft-overlooked era of Disney animation. Anyone who has watched it as well as the undisputed classics of the 1940s and the unforgettable endeavors of the early 1990s instantly recognizes that The Aristocats is not on the same level of quality. The most obvious comment that can be laid at its feet is the quality of the animation. There are a lot of 1970s Disney films that have received criticism for cheaper-looking animation, some of which have even been called out for re-using identical animation cels, simply replacing one set of characters for another! True enough, The Aristocats sports a simplified palette of detail, with the black outlines of characters extremely visible, especially in certain moments when the hair of human characters waves around. The film also chooses to keep its plot as simple as possible, forsaking anything epic. At first glance, even the stakes may be misconstrued as mundane in comparison to past Disney adventures. Then, of course, there is the matter of the odd voice casting for a film that occurs exclusively in France, much of it in the far less eclectic countryside.
The time for shooing The Aristocats to the wayside when discussing Disney canon has come to an end; instead, it justly deserves praise. Whereas most easily overlook the picture as little more than a curiosity in the Disney catalogue, director Wolfgang Reitherman and his team successfully combine charming slapstick humour and a deceptively simple story with a beating heart at its core. In addition to being a grin-inducing misadventure for Duchess and her kittens, the movie is ultimately a solid story about family in all its variations.
The family unit can take on multiple shapes, the two most popular being the blood-related family and the adoptive family. Animal lovers often consider their pets to be members of the family. Close friends may claim that they see one another as brothers, sisters, or that they share a parent-child dynamic. The Aristocats tackles all of these ideas in effortless fashion, avoiding the trappings of wishy-washy and dumbed-down storytelling adhering to the annoying assumption that children are too stupid to understand subtleties. At the start of the picture, it’s clearly established who the protagonists are: Duchess and her children Marie, Toulouse, and Berlioz. They form the most obvious family unit in the entire movie, close-knit despite the obvious sibling rivalry between the two boys and their sister. Thus, these four cats represent the most relatable interpretation of what people recognize as family. There is also the relationship Madame de Bonfamille shares with them. There are no two ways about it, Madame de Bonfamille treats Duchess and the kittens as if they were her own children. They sleep in a cozy, nicely built bed in her room, they get to travel with her whenever she leaves on her errands, and she seeks to comfort them on stormy nights just a mother would come to sooth a crying baby.
The family dynamics are explored further with a bit more nuance once Edgar expels the felines in the French countryside out of spite. Clueless as to which road lead back home, happenstance sees that the swinging Thomas O’Malley (his full name is a long one and speaks to his international background: Abraham de Lacy Giuseppe Casey Thomas O’Malley) walks into their path after the family spends a cold night sheltered from the rain under a bridge. O’Malley is, by all accounts, a player. His smooth talk and demeanor towards Duchess hint at just some of his typical proclivities, hopping from one fine female to another. He even has to hold back at one point from calling her a dame. For a minute, the children are out of sight and mind, thus encouraging O’Malley to woo Duchess for a good time. Naturally, the entire dynamic shifts once Marie makes her presence known, as do her brothers in quick succession after that. O’Malley, not exactly a family man, offers some service in guiding Duchess and the kittens back to Paris but opts to cut their ties early, until he realizes how slimy it is of him to renounce a relationship with Duchess just because she is a mother. From there, two additional familial angles are stressed upon, the first being the desire the children express of having a father figure around them and the second being O’Malley’s desire to settle down and maybe become a father himself. There are even other, more briefly explored family dynamics, such as that of the geese sisters Abigail and Amelia, who hope to meet up with their uncle in Paris and the group of jazz playing alley cats lead by Scat Cat (none other than Scatman Crothers), none of whom are directly related, but form a tightly knit unit glued together by an unshakable friendship.
The Aristocats is also effective at producing some belly laughs, many of which have to do with Edgar’s hazardous trips to the country where he always encounters a duo of interdependent dogs, Napoleon and his soldier Lafayette (Pat Buttram and George Lindsay, respectively) who chase after trespassers on their territory. The filmmakers take advantage of these sequences to concoct some of the more quintessentially wacky action often found in Disney animated fare. The circus act of attacks and counter-attacks performed by Edgar and the tag-teaming canines is over-the-top and, truth be told, does not quite fit in with the tone of the rest of the movie, but features many comically inventive moments. Even the characterizations of Napoleon and Lafayette are amusing and make it well worth spending time with them, even though their role plays no obvious part in how the cats get back to Paris.
Regarding the animation quality, no, The Aristocats does not look nearly as impressive as Bambi, Sleeping Beauty, or Fantasia, but its roughly edged effort has a certain charm. It feels a couple notches above the typical Saturday morning cartoon. The detail level is superior in both foreground and background elements, but not by leaps and bounds. Even so, images such as that of Notre-Dame de Paris on a dark and cloudy night as Edgar rides by on his noisy little scooter are attractive in their own way. The film gets by with its animation but is not necessarily great because of it. Sometimes the simplest touches are the most effective, however. A perfect example would be the opening credit sequence as well as the closing musical cue when single primary colours dominate the screen, even pouring into the outlines of the characters. Again, nothing terribly mind-blowing is offered, yet the filmmakers nonetheless make their modest efforts pay off.
Interestingly, the fact that nothing in The Aristocats looks particularly sophisticated works in tandem with the pacing. Even at less than 80 minutes in length, the story is never in any hurry to get where it needs to go. How could it? The plot is basically about how a group of cats get back to Paris, one of whom already knows the way. With the emphasis on the exploration of what it means to have a family in addition to a couple of extended action sequences, there is no purpose in rushing the plot. The pacing is relaxed, as if the filmmakers are taking a cue out of O’Malley’s playbook and, for lack of a better term, are free-styling it. Sit back, soak in the fun, and have a good time.
Finally, it would be remiss to not dissect the voice acting. Essentially, to properly analyze The Aristocats, the film needs to be watched in both its English- and French-language versions. After all, this is a story that transpires entirely in France where every character is supposedly French, save the trio of English geese. The voice acting is mostly quite diverse, often entertaining, and does help build character. Eva Gabor makes Duchess sound elegant and sophisticated, Roddy Maude-Roxby is appropriately snobbish as the butler, Scatman Crothers is Scatman Crothers (what else is there to say?), Phil Harris nicely balances O’Malley’s Sinatra-esque swinger and caring sides, etc. Make no mistake, The Aristocats features all-around solid voice acting. Despite that, it is a little bit strange for French speaking characters to talk like Hungarians, Englishmen, hip American jazz and lounge music artists or, in the case of Napoleon and Lafayette, rednecks. For those who speak Molière’s language, the French-language track is worth a listen. The accents are obviously more unified and are therefore much more fitting. What’s more, even the rare exceptions to the rule were well handled by the translation crew. The aforementioned English geese vacationing in France? They sound like the English do when taking their best shot at French: good command of the grammar, but smothered in that unmistakable English accent.
The Aristocats is a brisk bit of fun. Certainly when compared to the true classics, it pales but that feels like an unfair measurement. Movies should, for the most part, be judged on their own. In that light, the picture smartly addresses representation and significance of the family unit whilst offering terrifically catchy tunes and charming characters. Where should fans hoping to better appreciate Disney’s output from the 1970s start? Mais voyons, les Aristocats naturellement.
— Edgar Chaput