Robin des Bois

Disney's Robin Hood is my all time favorite Disney animation movie and right up there with one of my favorite all time movies. I can practically recite every word from "Robin Hood and Little John Walking through the Forest" to "There's the church bells someone's gett'n hitched". Yet it's hardly ever mentioned, it's always been hard to find and you can never get a poster. The songs are never lauded and they should be "The Phoney King of England" is a hoot! And even though "Love" was nominated for an Oscar, it's an obscure fact.

The animation is beautiful! Those scenes of the castle & the church in the rain - you would think it was shot rather than drawn. The dialog is smart with subtleties & wit. The character's motives are seen and not told. It's not dumb down at all for kids. It's more romantic then Lady & The Tramp, Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid combined. And yes, that Fox, Robin Hood himself, voiced by Brian Bedford was and will always be sexy!

It is strange how many people damn the Disney version of "Robin Hood" for rough and repetitious animation, one-dimensional characters, and weak pacing. After all, A LOT of animated films suffer from this syndrome, even "landmark" productions like "Anastasia" and "Shrek." The characters are stereotypes, but they act believably: Prince John is silly, but with a truly evil undercurrent ("Squeeze every last drop out of those insolent...musical...peasants."), the Sheriff is deliciously nasty ("Upsy-daisy"), and Robin Hood is very affable. The music is, quite simply, fantastic. "Not in Nottingham" is easily the best Disney song ever (barring "When She Loved Me" in Toy Story 2), the opening theme and song are catchy and appropriate for the movie's tone, and the movie's action scenes are clever, chaotic, and action-packed but not gory. This is a movie you can show your kids without being embarrassed upon seeing that the movie is one long commercial for action figures and plush toys.

Arguably the best pre-"Little Mermaid" Disney film, "Robin Hood" takes the characters from past Disney films and features such as Baloo (Jungle Book) and Rabbit (the Pooh films) and casts them in a classic re-telling of the popular Robin Hood fable. While not as historical as Kevin Costner's big to-do, nor always as laugh-out-loud ridiculous as Mel Brooks' affair, Disney's effort comes off as amiable and very likable. It's very much a product of its times but has a timeless quality that is unmatched, really, and the humor doesn't date itself as quickly as some of the jokes in recent Disney features have. The voice acting (as in almost every Disney film) is superb, but contains very few outstanding stars (Peter Ustinov's role is especially well-done, however). All in all, a film well-deserving of all the praise it receives.

I loved this movie as a kid, as did just about every person I know. So it works for the youngins. As an adult, and an animation fan, I was surprised to learn that this movie is sort of the Disney studio's secret shame. I had nothing but fond memories of it, after all. And I could name at least a dozen Disney films that I would have put ahead of it on my Most Crappy list. I very recently watched it on television after many years, and yes, it is definitely flawed. The quality of the animation is terrible, and the lack of an over arching story makes the whole thing seem frivolous, like it was made for TV and not for a big studio release. There are holes in the narrative, scenes that should exist that don't, and scenes that have no reason to exist that do. And I think the somewhat random decision to cast the film with animals lends to the Saturday morning vibe as well.

But there's enough cool things peaking out from under all the half-assery that rescues the film just enough for it to be enjoyable. Peter Ustinov turns in an excellent, excellent performance as Prince John, at turns hysterical and genuinely nasty. Brian Bedford oozes easy going charm as Robin. He's probably turned in the second most likable performance of the character captured on film. He's just unfortunately delivering it through the poorly animated mouth of a cartoon fox. And though the actual quality of the animation is poor, some of the character animation is pretty clever and expressive. And I have to applaud the choice to add Roger Miller to the mix as a folkie, possibly pot-smoking minstrel rooster. His character adds a cool, Earthy vibe to the proceedings and as others have mentioned, his song, Not in Nottingham, actually sort of works as a blues song. Weird.

So Robin Hood is definitely not the epic tale Disney was capable of churning out in its hey days, but I dug it as a kid, and I still dig it today. You know, looking back at all my reviews on this site, it seems I mostly leap to the defense of classically bad films that I like anyway. That's OK, I guess. Someone has to.

Disney's animated "Robin Hood" gets somewhat lost in the shuffle of great animated films from the famed studio, but is still a nice piece of entertainment that tells the popular story well. Good songs and fun situations are the greatest assets here. The film lacks the real drama that makes others of its kind better cinematically. Still a good film for the whole family. 4 stars out of 5.