The Fox and the Hound

The Fox and the Hound
File:Foxhoundposter.jpg
Directed by	Ted Berman Richard Rich
Written by	Ted Berman Larry Clemmons
Produced by	Ron Miller Art Stevens Wolfgang Reitherman
Starring	Mickey Rooney Kurt Russell Pearl Bailey Jack Albertson
Music by	Buddy Baker
Distributed by	Buena Vista Distribution
Release dates	July 10, 1981 (USA)
Running time	83 minutes
Language	English

The Fox and the Hound is a 1981 animated feature produced by Walt Disney Productions, first released to movie theatres in the U.S. on July 10, 1981. It is #5 on the all-time Disney cartoon rankings. The twenty-fourth animated feature in the Disney animated features canon, the film is loosely based on the Daniel P. Mannix novel The Fox and the Hound. The film centers around the story of two unlikely friends, a bloodhound and a red fox, who struggle to preserve their friendship. At the time of release it was the most expensive animated film produced to date, costing $12 million. A direct-to-video "midquel," The Fox and the Hound 2, was released on December 12, 2006.

Plot summary

A young red fox kit is left orphaned when his mother is shot by a hunter. A kindly owl, named Big Mama, arranges him to be adopted by the compassionate Widow Tweed as a pet on her farm. Tweed names the fox Tod. Meanwhile, Tweed's neighbor, an ill-tempered hunter named Amos Slade, brings home a young hound puppy named Copper. Slade introduces Copper to his experienced hunting dog Chief, who reluctantly cares for him.

Unlikely Friends

Tod and Copper meet and form a friendship they feel will last forever. Slade grows frustrated after Copper is constantly caught wandering off to play with Tod. After several meetings between Tod and Copper, Slade places Copper on a leash to stop him from wandering off.

Undeterred, Tod decides to play with Copper at his home. Tod's visit to Slade's farm becomes disastrous when he inadvertently awakens Chief, who promptly chases him throughout the farm. Slade enters the pursuit as well, trying to shoot Tod. The pursuit finally ends after Slade begins shooting at Widow Tweed's car, with Tod in tow. A furious Tweed takes Slade's gun out of his hand and shoots his car's radiator. After a fierce argument, the belligerent Slade makes it clear that he intends to kill Tod at his first opportunity.

For the rest of the summer Tod is limited to the house with Widow Tweed. The matter is shelved for the moment, with hunting season commencing, and Slade takes his dogs into the wilderness for the interim. Meanwhile, Big Mama explains to Tod that his friendship with Copper cannot continue, as they were bred to be enemies. Tod, in his innocence, states that he and Copper are "gonna be friends forever."

Months pass, and Copper becomes an excellent hunting dog. Upon Copper's return, Tod meets him during the night, thinking their friendship unchanged. Copper explains that he is a hunting dog now, and that they can no longer be friends. Their meeting is cut short when Chief awakens and alerts Slade. A chase ensues, but Copper diverts Chief and Slade so that Tod can escape. Unfortunately, Chief manages to maintain the pursuit, which carries onto a railroad track trestle. When a fast-moving train suddenly approaches, Tod is able to duck under the vehicle, but Chief is struck and wounded. Enraged, Copper blames Tod for the accident and swears vengeance.

Everything Has Changed Forever

Realizing that Tod cannot safely stay on her farm now, Tweed leaves him at a nature preserve, which has signs prohibiting hunting. Although Tod has a difficult time adjusting, Big Mama helps by introducing him to a young, beautiful vixen named Vixey. Tod first tries to impress Vixey by catching a fish, only to fail, causing Vixey and the other animals of the game reserve to laugh at him. Angry and hurt, Tod tells Vixey that she's "a silly, empty-headed...female!" Angered, they refuse to speak to each other, but Big Mama intervenes with the song "Appreciate the Lady" and directs Tod in being himself, and Vixey to give him another chance. They get along very well once Tod admits his lack of survival skills. Vixey is now aware of his inability to survive in the wild and helps him adapt.

Showdown in the Game Reserve

The vengeful Slade and Copper trespass into the preserve to kill Tod with leghold traps and guns. The result is a harrowing chase throughout the forest trying to catch Tod and Vixey that climaxes when Slade and Copper inadvertently provoke an attack from a disturbed bear. Against his better judgment, Tod intervenes to save his friend. He fights the much larger bear and ends up luring the bear on to a fallen trunk that breaks and sends the two falling down a waterfall.

Tod survives and meets Copper at shore, who is stunned at Tod's heroism for his sake in spite of current events. However, Slade does not share any gratitude and suddenly appears, still vindictively eager to kill the fox. Copper makes the moral decision of interposing his body in front of Tod, and Slade, reluctant to kill his own hound for a petty vendetta against a fox who had just saved their lives, is forced to give up and return home. The fox and hound share one final smile before going their separate ways.

In the final scene, as Copper rests in his dog house, he hears Tod's voice of when they were young saying that they would be friends forever. He smiles at this, and falls asleep. The view then backs out to a small hill, where Vixey joins Tod, looking at both houses.

Cast

• Mickey Rooney as Tod
• Kurt Russell as Copper
• Pearl Bailey as Big Mama
• Jack Albertson as Amos Slade
• Jeanette Nolan as Widow Tweed
• Pat Buttram as Chief
• Keith Coogan as Young Tod
• Corey Feldman as Young Copper
• Sandy Duncan as Vixey
• Paul Winchell as Boomer
• Richard Bakalyan as Dinky
• John Fiedler as The Porcupine
• John McIntire as The Grumpy Badger
• Frank Welker as Squeeks
• Mel Blanc as Bear
• Clarence Nash as Ducks

Supervising animators

• Randy Cartwright
• Glen Keane (The Bear)
• Cliff Nordberg
• Ron Clements
• Frank Thomas
• Ollie Johnston

The New Generation Animators

This film represented a changing of the guard of the animators creating the film from Walt's Disney's "nine old men" to the more recently trained Disney animators who had moved through the in-house animation training program begun in 1976.

The story was based on Daniel Mannix's 1967 book The Fox and the Hounds, Tod the fox who befriended a hunting dog named Copper and much more realistic. It ended with a hunter nailing Tod's lifeless pelt to the wall then euthanizing Copper with his shotgun.

The story was changed to be more Disney-like with a happy ending and was the last work of the remaining original animators. Don Bluth worked as an animator on this film, but left Disney early in the production, taking 11 Disney animators (which comprised 17% of the production staff) with him to start his own rival studio, Don Bluth Productions. This studio, which eventually became Sullivan Bluth Studios, was Disney's main rival through the early 1990s and later produced The Secret of NIMH and a number of other well-known films. As a result of Bluth's defection, production on The Fox and the Hound was delayed by nearly six months.

The co-directors for the film were Ted Berman (December 17, 1919 - July 15, 2001), Richard Rich, and Art Stevens.

Berman previously had credits as a character animator for the 1961 feature film One Hundred and One Dalmatians and writer for the 1977 film The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. He would later be co-director for the 1985 film The Black Cauldron.

Rich had been a Disney employee since 1972 but this was his first major assignment. He would also serve as a co-director for The Black Cauldron. He would later found Rich Animation Studios. Their best known film is arguably the 1994 film The Swan Princess.

Stevens was previously credited as a character animator for the 1953 Peter Pan, the previously mentioned One Hundred and One Dalmatians and the 1973 Robin Hood. He had also previously directed the 1977 film The Rescuers.

Originally, the writers of the film intended for Chief to die when he got hit by the train, so that Copper's revenge against Tod is more extreme. Story veteran Vance Gerry argued for the department: "But he gets hit in the kisser with a freight train!!" To which Ron Miller and co-director Art Stevens countered: "Geez, we never killed a main character in a Disney film and we're not starting now!" As was also the case in Lady and the Tramp, where Trusty is seemingly killed but in a later scene has recovered, Chief suffers major injuries but is saved from death.

John Lasseter started out working at Disney on this film and others such as Mickey's Christmas Carol before leaving to join Pixar in 1986. With Disney's purchasing of Pixar, Lasseter has gone full circle and has returned to the company he started his career with.

Other new animators who worked on this film and some of their future successes:

• John Musker and Ron Clements (story artist and animator): Producer-director team of The Great Mouse Detective, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules, and Treasure Planet.
• Tim Burton (assistant & development artist): Producer of The Nightmare Before Christmas and Corpse Bride.
• Glen Keane (animator): Animation creator and designer of characters Ariel, Beast, Aladdin and Pocahontas.
• Jerry Reese (animator): Director of The Brave Little Toaster.
• Brad Bird (animator): director of Warner Bros.' The Iron Giant, The Incredibles, Ratatouille and previously of The Simpsons.
• Chris Buck (animator): Director of Disney's Tarzan.
• Don Bluth (animator): Director of The Secret of NIMH, An American Tail, The Land Before Time, and All Dogs Go to Heaven
• John H. Williams (animators): Producer of Shrek and Shrek 2.

Release history

The Fox and the Hound was released in theatres in 1981 and 1988. It was the last VHS video of the "Classics Collection" in 1994 (it was not included in the "Masterpiece Collection"). It was released on "Gold Collection" DVD in 2000.

On October 10th, 2006, The Fox and the Hound 25th Anniversary Special Edition was released.

International release dates

• Argentina: July 23, 1981
• West Germany: November 13, 1981
• Italy: November 19, 1981
• France: November 25, 1981
• Spain: November 27, 1981
• Sweden: December 5, 1981
• Finland: December 11, 1981
• Australia: December 17, 1981
• Netherlands: December 24, 1981
• Japan: March 12, 1983

Critical reaction

Although the film was a financial success, the general reaction by film critics to the film was mixed. Many were disappointed that the predominantly young creative staff, many of whom had only recently joined the company, had produced a film that seemed very conservative in both concept and execution. Other critics, like Richard Corliss of Time Magazine, praised the film for its intelligent story about prejudice. He argued the film shows that prejudiced attitudes can poison even the deepest relationships, and the film's bittersweet ending delivers a powerful and important moral message to audiences.

Nevertheless, the film gained a cult following, and it was awarded a Golden Screen Award at the Goldene Leinwand Awards in 1982. It was also nominated for a Young Artist Award and the Saturn Award for Best Fantasy Film.

Trivia

• In the scene where Tod tries to find shelter in the woods during a rainstorm, we see a family of ducks in animation lifted from Disney's 1942 feature Bambi. Also borrowed in the movie are a twice-appearing family of quail (again from Bambi) and a squirrel whose appearance is identical to Wart/Arthur as a squirrel in The Sword in the Stone.
• The bear's growl was a recording of Shere Khan's growl from The Jungle Book.
• The last Disney animated feature to begin with the complete opening credits and end with a "The End: Walt Disney Productions" credit, like all previous Disney films after Alice in Wonderland. The next Disney animated feature, The Black Cauldron, was the first to have closing credits.
• The last Disney animated feature to be made with entirely analog techniques.
• The first Disney animated feature not to use line overlay since The Jungle Book.
• Tim Burton did design work on the film, working as an in-between animator for Tod's friend Vixey.
• There is a small reference to a previous Disney animation, Robin Hood, when watching the seven quail chicks crossing in front of them, Vixey counts them and mentions that 'I think six would be just right'; she was referring to kits, but she does so subtly enough to confuse Tod. In Robin Hood, while fighting against the guards Robin tells Maid Marian that they would have six children. In both cases, the couples are foxes, only in Robin Hood they are anthropomorphised.
• In fox hunting, a fox is called a tod. Widow Tweed names Tod, though, ironically, because he is "such a little toddler."
• This was the second (and last) time a bear fell from a waterfall in a Disney film, the previous being Fun and Fancy Free.
• This was the first Disney film to not have a traditional happy ending. This did not recur until 1995's Pocahontas.
• In the 2007 film Shrek the Third a different setting of Widow Tweed's farm is spotted at Wochershire.

Soundtrack Listing

• "Best of Friends" Music by Richard Johnston, Lyrics by Stan Fidel, Performed by Pearl Bailey
• "Lack of Education" Music and Lyrics by Jim Stafford, Performed by Pearl Bailey
• "A Huntin' Man" Music and Lyrics by Jim Stafford, Performed by Jack Albertson
• "Appreciate the Lady" Music and Lyrics by Jim Stafford, Performed by Pearl Bailey
• "Goodbye May Seem Forever" Music by Richard Rich, Lyrics by Jeffrey Patch, Performed by Jeanette Nolan

External links

• The Fox and the Hound at IMDb