Thirty-seven years ago this week, The Fox and the Hound rolled into theaters after a protracted production. It was the first animated feature from the House of Mouse since The Rescuers in 1977. And it had its share of milestones:
F & H was the last feature on which Disney veterans Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnston, and Larry Clemmons (Disney employees since Hyperion days) lent their talents.
Wolfgang Reitherman, longtime head of the department, stepped down. (He had worked as a supervisor on almost every animated feature since Snow White.)
Don Bluth, one of the younger directing animators, walked out with one third of the staff to make the indie feature The Secret of NIMH, setting the release of The Fox and the Hound back by a year.
It was the first Disney feature on which animation legend Glen Keane made a significant mark. Glen boarded and animated the climactic bear fight sequence, and went on to be a key player inside the department for the next thirty years.
The Fox and the Hound was the sole hand-drawn feature on which director Tim Burton worked.
And it was the first studio project during which the Cal Arts brigade (John Lasseter, Joe Ranft, John Musker, various others) would begin to come into their own.
Beyond everything else, The Fox and the Hound, started by Disney's old guard, completed by the new, represents the point in Disney history when you could stand on the mountainside and stare backward with the people who were around near the beginning, and also peer forward with the newcomers into a future yet to be.
From 1977 to 1981, while F & H was in production, the old and the new were gathered together, making one final/first animated feature as a single unit.
For more on the "The Fox and the Hound", see here and here. And thanks to Tom Sito for reminding me another anniversary of "F & H" has come.
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