Larry Clemmons Movies

The Disney animated feature The Fox and the Hound tells the story of a friendship between traditional enemies. Tod is a fox whose parents have died. His best friend is a hunting dog named Copper. As Copper grows up, he learns that it is his job to hunt foxes. Tod's caretaker Widow Tweed takes Tod to live in a game preserve where he falls madly in love with Vixey. Copper and his owner eventually enter the preserve to hunt Tod, and eventually Copper must decide between duty and friendship. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

Robin Hood is one of the first animated films produced by the Walt Disney Company after Walt Disney's death in 1967. For the film, the studio's animators took the Disney tradition of adding human-like animal sidekicks to established tales (Cinderella, Pinnochio) a step further by making Robin Hood's legendary characters creatures themselves. Robin Hood (Brian Bedford) is a wily fox; Maid Marian (Monica Evans) is a beautiful vixen; Little John (Phil Harris) is a burly bear; Friar Tuck (Andy Devine) is a soft-spoken badger; the Sheriff of Nottingham (Pat Buttram) is a greedy wolf; and the scheming Prince John (Peter Ustinov) is a sniveling, groveling, thumb-sucking undersized lion with a serpent sidekick named Sir Hiss (Terry Thomas). The film begins after Prince John and Sir Hiss have tricked the true King into leaving the country on a phony crusade. With the help of the Sheriff of Nottingham, they tax the life out of Nottingham's peasants, leaving them all penniless but with the courageous Robin Hood as their only hope. ~ Aubry Anne D'Arminio, Rovi

The final animated feature produced under the supervision of Walt Disney is a lively neo-swing musical, loosely based upon the tales of Rudyard Kipling. The story takes place in a tropical jungle where people are conspicuously absent. But one day Bagheera the Panther (voice of Sebastian Cabot) discovers a baby in the wreck of a boat. Feeling pity on the child, Bagheera takes him to be raised with the wolves. Ten years later, the child has grown into Mowgli (voice of Bruce Reitherman). Mowgli discovers that his life is in danger because of the return to the area of Shere Khan the Tiger (voice of George Sanders), whose hatred of humans is such that Mowgli faces certain death if discovered. Bagheera agrees to transport Mowgli to the human village, where he will be safe from Shere Khan. Along the way to the village, night falls and Mowgli and Bagheera almost succumb to the man-eating snake Kaa (voice of Sterling Holloway). Escaping Kaa's coils, they run into the lock-step military elephant band of Colonel Hathi (voice of J. Pat O'Malley). Afterwards, Mowgli, who doesn't want to be sent to the human village, runs away from Bagheera and meets up with the fun-loving Baloo the Bear (voice of Phil Harrris). With both Bagheera and Baloo to protect him, Mowgli is saved from several more life-threatening situations -- including a barber-shop quartet of vultures, the crazed King Louie of the Apes (voice of Louis Prima), and Shere Khan himself -- before making it to the village of humans. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

Another of Walt Disney Presents' "hybrid" episodes, this one is comprised of two previously released short subjects. The first is '60s Gala Day at Disneyland, a tour of the famous Anaheim theme park. For the purposes of this telecast, new footage is added to showcase Disneyland's most up-to-date attractions. The remainder of the episode consists of the "True-Life Adventure" entry The Olympic Elk, a saga of the annual elk migrations in Washington State's Olympic Peninsula. (This sequence was first telecast as part of the 1955 Disneyland installment Behind the True Life Cameras - Olympic Elk). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Although the 25th anniversary of the creation of Disney cartoon character Donald Duck actually occurred in 1959 (he'd made his first appearance in the 1934 Silly Symphony The Wise Little Hen), this 1960 episode of Walt Disney Presents commemorates Donald's first major role in the 1935 Mickey Mouse vehicle The Orphan's Benefit. After showing clips from that film, in which Donald struggles to deliver a recitation of "Mary Had a Little Lamb," the episode shows his progression to full-fledged star of his own cartoon series. Among the highlights is a sequence showing a Donald Duck cartoon translated into different languages. The episode closes as Walt Disney bestows the coveted "Duckstar" award on the irascible Mr. Duck. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This episode of Walt Disney Presents pays homage to the illustations of artist Heinrich Kley, who specialized in pictures of elephants. Host Walt Disney explains that it was Kley's genius that inspired such animated sequences as the "Dance of the Hours" segment (with its ballet-dancing pachyderms) in the 1940 animated feature Fantasia and the "Pink Elephants on Parade" number in 1941's Dumbo. The remainder of the episode consists of Niok, a "People and Places" short subject originally released theatrically in 1957. Filmed in the jungles of Cambodia, this segment details the relationship between Chinese village boy Ayot Van Koen and his beloved pet, a 6-month-old Indian elephant named Niok. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

A Disneyland salute to America's roadways--past, present, and future--this episode is an agreeable blend of animation (much of produced especially for TV) and live action. Chronicling the early days of motor transportation, the episode features rare newsreel footage of the opening of the Lincoln Highway in 1913. Also seen in this segment is a satirical recreation of the perils of driving in the first two decades of the 20th century (for example, a driver might have to disassemble his entire car so as not to frighten a passing horse), as enacted by members of the Horseless Carriage Club, Southern California chapter. The animated portion of the program offers amusing glimpse of contemporary driving problems (with lots of archaic "woman driver" jokes) before seguing into a fanciful speculation of the Highway of the Future. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The very first Disney feature to include live-action footage, this behind-the-scenes documentary about the studio's animation process includes the cartoon short of the title, which in later years was often exhibited separately from this film. Robert Benchley stars as himself, a visitor to the Disney lot, where he intends to pitch an animated version of the children's fairy tale The Reluctant Dragon by Kenneth Grahame to Walt Disney himself. Benchley wanders away from his studio-appointed guide and tours the facilities himself, where he sees various new cartoons in the process of being storyboarded, including a Baby Weems short. Benchley also meets Clarence Nash, the voice of Donald Duck, and a young animator (played by Alan Ladd) before being corralled to Disney's screening room, where he is shown the company's new short, none other than The Reluctant Dragon. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi