The Rescuers

A quick look at The Rescuers today will reveal an odd Disney-hybrid that bears little resemblance to both the classic early Disney films of the 1940s and the equally popular blockbusting efforts from the 1990s. It would be fair to say that Disney lost their way a little in the 1970s and the early 1980s, the adoption of a more detailed and less stylised visual tone for The Rescuers makes it feel historically isolated, and it probably didn't help that this was a transitionary period that saw the old guard of Disney's animators make way for newer and less experienced talent. There are a lot of other aspects to this film that nostalgically links it to the 1970s, but overall it seems to have lost touch with what makes the best Disney films so great (despite it's success at the time of its release)

We have a dramatic painting-like opening credits sequence that pre-supposes the drab and more realistic look of the overall production. I just can't get excited about animation that seeks to recreate reality to some degree, it also doesn't help that The Rescuers is set in the contemporary world. Cars, escalators, helicopters, grimy cityscapes - there unfortunately just isn't much awe or wonder in a realistic vision of the 1970s, even if there are some talking mice in it. The latter part of the film concerns itself with the dark swamps of New Orleans, which might've been a cool excuse for a certain flavour of story or some exciting set pieces, but beyond a couple of fat crocodiles there isn't much of note.

The film takes an adventure/mystery format and puts some 'unlikely' heroes at its centre (the lowly janitor Bernard, a [shock, horror] female rescuer named Bianca, and the clumsy albatross Orville) but their heroics take a backseat to the antics of the ugly, trashy villainess Madame Medusa (Geraldine Page) and the child she kidnaps. Actually, while we're on that subject, the little kidnapped girl is a shamelessly manipulative character in terms of design and execution... for a start, she's a typically Disney-fied 'cute' kid. To compound our natural instinct to want to see her protected though she's also a toddler, an orphan, very earnest, has some teeth missing and carries around a teddy bear. It tugs at your heartstrings no matter how aware you might be of how cynical it is, probably due to the side effects of nostalgia evoked by how closely it's tied to the 1970s (helped in spades by the dated music and the fact that it's also set in the 1970s). The sophisticated Bianca is also very much a conscious post-women's lib heroine, a prototype for the kind of proactive female protagonists that would rise with Disney's comeback in the late 1980s (hello Little Mermaid).

I'm hesitant to bag out The Rescuers too much, it was obviously successful enough to spawn Disney's first (and so far only) cinematically-released animated sequel, and I guess it has a certain 70s charm to it. I just found it a little underwhelming and I can't help being cynical in response to its muted colour palette.

DIRECTOR: Wolfgang Reitherman, John Lounsbery, Art Stevens.

WRITER/SOURCE: Larry Clemmons, Vance Gerry, Ken Anderson, Frank Thomas, Burny Mattinson, Fred Lucky, Dick Sebast and Dave Michener. Based on a series of novels by Margery Sharp.

KEY ACTORS: Bob Newhart, Eva Gabor, Geraldine Page, Bernard Fox

RELATED TEXTS:

- The children's series The Rescuers by Margery Sharp, in particular the first two novels: The Rescuers and Miss Bianca.

- Disney followed this film up with a sequel, The Rescuers Down Under.

- The villain Medusa was originally intended to be Cruella de Vil from 101 Dalmations.

- Oliver and Company(a 1980s Disney film) was originally going to follow up on the character of the little kidnapped girl and her cat Rufus, but this was changed in the pre-production stage.

- Also see the animated Disney TV series Chip n Dale Rescue Rangers.

AWARDS

Academy Awards - nominated Best Song (Someone's Waiting for You).