The Aristocats (1970)
Based on a story by Tom McGowan and Tom Rowe originally written for Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color.
Intro song (“The Aristocats”). In 1910, mother cat Duchess and her three kittens (Berlioz, Marie, and Toulouse) live in Paris with retired opera diva Madame Adelaide Bonfamille, and her English butler, Edgar. The cats are pampered pets that live a luxurious lifestyle, and are very cultured in art and music like their owner (“Scales and Arpeggios”).
One day, while preparing her will with elderly lawyer Georges Hautecourt, Madame declares that her vast fortune will be first left to her cats, then revert to Edgar once they all pass away. Edgar overhears this through a speaking tube and, after erroneously calculating that he will die before he can inherit, plots to eliminate the cats. He sedates them by putting sleeping pills in a dish of cream, Creme de la Creme a la Edgar, and then drives them on his motorcycle out to the countryside in a basket. There, he is ambushed by two hounds named Napoleon and Lafayette, losing his hat, sidecar, umbrella, shoes, and the basket before escaping. The cats are left stranded in the countryside, while Madame Adelaide, Roquefort the mouse, and Frou-Frou the horse discover their absence.
In the morning, Duchess meets an alley cat named Thomas O’Malley (“Thomas O’Malley Cat”), who offers to guide her and the kittens to Paris. The group briefly hitchhikes in a milk truck (“She Never Felt Alone”) before being chased out by the driver. Later, while crossing a railroad trestle, the cats narrowly avoid an oncoming train, and Marie falls into a river. O'Malley immediately dives in and rescues her, and is himself rescued by Amelia and Abigail Gabble, two British geese on holiday. The geese lead the cats to the outskirts of Paris, then depart to deal with their inebriated Uncle Waldo. Meanwhile, Edgar returns to the countryside to retrieve his possessions—the only evidence that can incriminate him—from Napoleon and Lafayette and, after some difficulty, ultimately succeeds.
Traveling across the rooftops of the city, the cats meet up with O'Malley's friend Scat Cat and his musicians, who perform the song (“Ev'rybody Wants to Be a Cat”). After the band has departed, O'Malley and Duchess converse on a nearby rooftop while the kittens listen at a windowsill. Duchess' loyalty to Madame prompts her to decline O'Malley's marriage proposal. The next day, Duchess and the kittens return to Madame's mansion. Edgar finds them before Madame does, and places them in a sack, deciding to ship them to Timbuktu. Roquefort catches up with O'Malley at Duchess’ instruction, and O'Malley returns to the mansion, sending Roquefort to find Scat Cat and his gang. Though he struggles to explain the situation to the alley cats, Roquefort successfully brings them to O'Malley's aid. O'Malley, the alley cats, and Frou-Frou fight Edgar, while Roquefort frees Duchess and the kittens. At the end of the fight, Edgar is locked in his own packing-case and sent to Timbuktu himself, never to be seen again.
The Aristocats return to Madame Adelaide, who, ignorant of the real reason for Edgar's departure, rewrites her will to exclude him. After adopting O'Malley into the family, Madame establishes a charity foundation, housing Paris' stray cats in the mansion. Scat Cat and his gang are the first to move in, and reprise their song so loudly that the two hound dogs can hear it out in the countryside (“Ev'rybody Wants to Be a Cat”).
TRIVIA
Music
Shun Gon the Siamese Cat plays the piano with a pair of chopsticks aas seen in Scat Cat’s performance of “Ev’rybody Wants to Be a Cat”. His depiction is quite a controversial Chinese racial stereotype with future releases removing his lyrics: “Shanghai, Hong Kong, egg foo yung, fortune cookie always wrong”