elicopperman
After Don Bluth beat Disney financially with An American Tail, the Disney company put more time and effort into their work to compete with Bluth. Alongside the highly ambitious and legendary masterpiece Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the company released a loose adaptation of Oliver Twist in 1988 called Oliver & Company, which ended up being beaten out by The Land Before Time both critically and financially. The following year, the Disney company would actually beat Bluth with The Little Mermaid (and begin the Disney Renaissance), but that's a story for another day. As for what I think of this film...well, it's not by any means bad, but I think I would have liked this more had I grown up with it, because as a whole, this film is just ok albeit kinda forgettable.The aspect about this film I admired the most was the heart, as it is about a cat named Oliver who sticks by a gang of homeless dogs and their master before getting adopted by a rich girl named Jenny Foxworth, who is soon taken away by a lone shark. While the similarities between Charles Dickens' work are rather obvious, the friendship that Oliver obtains with the dog Dodger is genuine enough and it does give the film a heartwarming mood. Admittedly, the characters themselves aren't really that memorable, and the most that sticks out from them are their voice actors or their one personality trait. Oliver is a lonely kitten who wants a family, Dodger is the streetwise mutt, Fagin is the dopey owner who tries to pay ransom because he got into a bad situation with the lone shark Sykes, and the other dogs...honestly I barely remember much about them. The only secondary characters I remember enough and find amusing are Tito and Georgette due to their quirky and aggressive nature and splendid vocal performances by Cheech Marin and Bette Midler. Oh yeah, and Jenny....uh....well, she's likable enough.Another thing that's rather shocking about this film is how aggressive it can be. The film was actually supposed to be even darker and grittier than what we got, but if you ask me, this one of the more gruesome and dark Disney films out there. Without giving too much away, let's just say that whenever the antagonist Sykes and his dobermans are onscreen, it ain't a pretty sight. Then again, this is the same company that gave us the death of Bambi's mom, Lampwick turning into a donkey, and the death of Mufasa, so why am I surprised?To the film's credit, some of the musical numbers are fantastic. Once Upon a Time in New York City (co-written by the legend himself Howard Ashman) is so beautiful and heartbreaking that it even made me cry, Perfect Isn't Easy is delightfully entertaining, and Why Should I Worry is one of the catchiest and downright dynamite musical numbers you'll ever hear in a Disney movie, aided by the wonderful Billy Joel. That being said, they are pretty dated given how much they sound like products of the 1980s, and the other musical numbers like Streets of Gold and Good Company left much to be desired.Lastly, the animation is pretty good, and the animators definitely had fun crafting lovable characters and smooth movements. Also, roughly 10 minutes worth of Cgi was incorporated into the film, and most of the time it's barely noticeable it blends so well. However, I think New York City was better depicted in Madagascar and The Secret Life of Pets, and the constant advertisements don't help much. Not to mention, at times the actual animation looks kinda stilted and cheap, making the film look like if a movie made by Filmation had they been given a higher budget. I know the film's director worked at Hanna Barbara before, but that's no excuse when your film costs $31 million dollars to make....at the House of Mouse no less.To sum it all up, while there are some very enjoyable moments in Oliver & Company, it didn't offer enough for me to call it memorable. While it has its heart in the right place, the animation is decent enough, some characters are amusing in their own right, and half the songs are splendid, the predictable story, bland majority of the cast and dated material keep this film from rising above being decent if nothing special. I can understand why people would be nostalgic for this movie, and if you happen to love this movie with all your heart, that's great. Besides, even if this movie wasn't for me, I'll always cherish Dodger's street savoir faire.
ersinkdotcom
Sometimes the movies you see as a child don't hold up so well when you experience them again as an adult. "The Rescuers" and "Atlantis: The Lost Empire" still carry the same magic they did when I first saw them. I've also discovered a few I didn't see the first time around which now hold a special place in my heart, with "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" immediately coming to mind. Unfortunately, there are also a couple that lose their luster when viewed again through older eyes, like "The Sword in the Stone." I'll be adding "Oliver and Company" to the last category.A wayward kitten named Oliver spends his days and nights wandering the streets of New York City. While searching for food, he runs into a dog named Dodger who spends his days scrounging up food for his misfit family of stray dogs and assisting their homeless human friend Fagin make ends meet. Just as Oliver joins the canine clan, he is adopted by a girl named Penny. Danger materializes in the form of a pack of Dobermans that Penny's parents. They take a disliking to Oliver and plan to remove the threat to their home any way they can."Oliver and Company" is nothing more than a water-downed version of "Oliver Twist" that injects the sounds of Billy Joel, Bette Midler, and Broadway musicals together into one intolerable experience. Replace the humans in Charles Dickens' classic novel with animals and you have a recipe for annoyance. It's 74 minutes of sheer pain and agony for parents to endure while their children smile and giggle at the cuteness unfolding on screen.One of the biggest problems with "Oliver and Company" is they dumb down the main villain of the book. The character of Fagin from Dickens' novel is a perfect example of evil and cruelty. Disney makes him a sympathetic bumbling bad guy with a good heart in this animated version.
Stompgal_87
I didn't hear about this film until around 1996/1997 when it was heavily publicised in the UK, which made me think it initially came out at around that time. When I found out that this film originally came out in 1988, I was surprised but wasn't disappointed since my sister and I loved this film as children and as young women (I'm 26 and my sister's 22) we still love it to this day.Although the animation is linear and quite flat (which is present in other Disney films such as 'The Jungle Book' and 'The Rescuers'), the lip-sync on the human and animal characters is detailed as well as their facial expressions, despite the absence of tears falling from Jenny's eyes when she confronts Fagin about Oliver being 'kidnapped.' The most positive aspects of this film are its swift pace (particularly during the climax where Sykes and his Dobermans chase Fagin, Jenny and the other animals down the subway track); the talented and relatively well-known voice cast including Billy Joel (Dodger), Bette Midler (Georgette) and Cheech Marin (Tito) of 'Cheech and Chong' fame; the background designs (especially the bird's-eye views of New York City and Central Park); and the songs (the ever-so-catchy 'Why Should I Worry?' and the sweet 'Good Company' are standouts). Jenny and Oliver are sweet while Georgette is beautiful and Tito is comical, although I would like to have seen Jenny reunite with her parents and show them Oliver.As well as the 1968 musical 'Oliver!' this is one of my favourite adaptations of the classic Charles Dickens novel and also one of the most underrated films I've ever seen. 9/10.
