Robin Hood

Wolfgang Reitherman’s 1973 Disney animation tells the legend with animals: with King Richard away on crusade, Prince John taxes Nottingham into the ground and Robin the fox and Little John the bear steal it back. Ken Anderson brought the idea to studio president Card Walker in October 1968 and built the characters from Disney’s long shelved Reynard the Fox material. By Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston’s account, Reitherman rejected Anderson’s goat sheriff and insisted on the conventional wolf. Prince John and King Richard are voiced by the same man, Peter Ustinov. Little John is Phil Harris, who had voiced Baloo in The Jungle Book. On a five million dollar budget, with development late, the crew reused dance animation from earlier features, most visibly in the Phony King of England number, whose sources are Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, The Jungle Book and The Aristocats. Its only Academy Award nomination came at the 46th ceremony, for the song Love, music by George Bruns, lyrics by Floyd Huddleston; The Way We Were won. A good fit if you enjoy catching where the Phony King of England number borrows its dancing, and want to hear Ustinov play both brothers. Not for you if you want the 83 minutes tied to one plot; the film is a run of separate raids.