An American Tail

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

An American Tail is a beautifully rendered animated flim that tells an overly familiar story in terms children can easily understand. Fievel Mousekewitz and his family of Russian-Jewish mice escape from their homeland in the late 1800s, boarding a boat headed toward America to evade the Czarist rule of the Russian cats. Fievel, however, is separated from his family upon his arrival in New York City, and he discovers to his horror that there are cats in America too (his father said there weren't). Fievel meets his share of friendly and hostile mice, and he eventually befriends a cat as well. Former Disney animator Don Bluth co-produced and directed this often heartwarming yarn, the first animated feature presented by Steven Spielberg, and it has its charms despite a number of cliche situations. ~ Don Kaye, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:

• Region: 1
• Number of Discs: 1
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (Pre-1954 Standard)
• Audio: Dolby Digital Surround
• Features:
  • Sing-along -song
  • Interactive fun
  • -Counting with digit game
  • -Fievel and Tiger's duo dance
  • -Rewease the secwet weapon game

AWARDS

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

•     Nominated Best Song - 1986 (Cynthia Weil, James Horner, Barry Mann)

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Cathianne Blore - Bridget
       Dom DeLuise - Tiger,
       John Finnegan - Warren T. Rat
       Philip Glasser - Fievel Mousekewitz
       Amy Green - Tanya Mousekewitz
       Madeline Kahn - Gussie Mausheimer, voise of
       Pat Musick - Tony Toponi
       Nehemiah Persoff - Papa Mousekewitz
       Christopher Plummer - Henri,
       Neil Ross - Honest John
       Will Ryan - Digit
       Erica Yohn - Mama Mousekewitz
       Hal Smith - Moe

• Director:

  Don Bluth

• Producer:

  Don Bluth, Judith Freudberg, Gary Goldman, Kathleen Kennedy, David Kirschner, Frank Marshall, John Pomeroy, Steven Spielberg

• Screen Story:

  Judith Freudberg

• Screenwriter:

  Judith Freudberg, Tony Geiss

• Screen Story:

  Tony Geiss

• Composer (Music Score):

  James Horner

• Songwriter:

  James Horner

• Composer (Music Score):

  Barry Mann

• Songwriter:

  Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil

• Editor:

  Dan Molina

• Animator:

  Dan Kuenster, Linda Miller, John Pomeroy

REVIEW:

• In the early 1980s, Don Bluth led a team of animators away from Disney to pursue the kind of ambitious feature-length fare that the House of Mouse seemed to have forgotten. The defectors' sophomore effort was the impressive An American Tail, a film that maintains the Disney touch for filmmaking but leaves some of the sugar-coating behind. The film tackles the American immigrant experience, and doesn't shy far away from showing either the hardships that caused emigres to leave their homelands or the hardships they faced on upon arrival. Despite this occasional, and welcomed, earnestness however, the lively animation, spirited voicing (Dom DeLuise in particular) and James Horner's score (including the lovely "Somewhere Out There" ) keep this an uplifting, and often touching, experience. Steven Speilberg produced the movie, but his and Bluth's talent for storytelling occasionally falters, and the film never quite achieves the Disney polish. Moreover, while the story follows what is clearly a Jewish experience of flight from Russian pogroms, it never makes specific reference of the Mouskewitz family's ethnic background, a decision that some saw less as an attempt to ensure universal appeal, and more as a cowardly cultural duck. In general, though, Bluth and company display the same willingness to explore serious themes as they did in their first feature, The Secret of NIMH. Though highly enjoyable, the film is definitely darker than most kids' fare. But with serious themes comes the potential for lasting impact, and as such, An American Tail offers much more than just an hour and a half of mind-candy. ~ Matthew Doberman, Rovi