The AristoCats (1970) on Netflix
G19701h 18mAdventureAnimationComedy
In 1910 Paris, Duchess and her kittens Berlioz, Marie and Toulouse are set to inherit Madame Adelaide Bonfamille's fortune. The butler, Edgar Balthazar, hears the will and plots against them.
- Netflix3.9/5
- IMDb7.1/10126,901 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes64%
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Plot summary
In 1910, Madame Adelaide Bonfamille, a retired opera diva, draws up her will in her Paris villa with her lawyer, Georges Hautecourt. Her fortune is to go to her cultured cat Duchess and Duchess's kittens, the pianist Berlioz, the painter Toulouse and the would-be lady Marie, and then to her butler, Edgar Balthazar, only after the cats are gone. Edgar hears it all through a speaking tube and reckons he will not outlive them. He slips sleeping pills into a dish of cream, carries the sleeping cats away in a basket on his motorcycle and leaves them on a country road. There Duchess meets Thomas O'Malley, a stray who offers to guide the family back to Paris.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The AristoCats (1970)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Louis Armstrong was initially reported to voice Scat Cat, but he had to back out of the project due to illness; out of desperation, Scatman Crothers was hired to voice the character under the direction to imitate Armstrong.
- Walt Disney appointed Ken Anderson to develop preliminary work on The Aristocats, making it the last film project to be personally approved by Walt before his death.
- Disney film producer Bill Anderson suggested Maurice Chevalier should sing the title song; Richard Sherman then imitated Chevalier's voice as he performed a demo, and on receiving it Chevalier was brought out of retirement to sing the song.
- The Aristocats was the last Disney animated feature Robert and Richard Sherman worked on as staff songwriters, growing frustrated by the studio's management following Disney's death; they would not return until they were asked to compose songs for The Tigger Movie in 2000.
- In 2021 the film was one of several that Disney limited to viewers 7 years of age and older on Disney+, stating that the character Shun Gon was a racist stereotype of East Asian people.
- The Aristocats was the most widely-attended film in France in 1971, with 12.7 million in ticket admissions, and it is currently the 20th highest-grossing film of all time in France.
- For cultural reasons the Italian dubbing changes O'Malley to Romeo, er mejo der Colosseo ("Romeo, the best cat of the Colosseum"), an Italian cat from Rome, because alley cats were well known for frequenting the Colosseum at the time.
