The Rescuers Down Under
Directors: Hendel Butoy, Mike Gabriel
Cast: Eva Gabor, Bob Newhart, Adam Ryen, George C. Scott, John Candy, Tristan Rogers, Frank Welker Wayne Robson, Bernard Fox, Ed Gilbert, Carla Meyer, Douglas Seale, Peter Firth, Billy Barty
Cody (Adam Ryen), a boy living in the Australian outback, frees a rare golden eagle from a poacher’s trap. When an evil poacher named McCleach (George C. Scott) kidnaps Cody to use as bait to catch the rare eagle, a group of local animals contacts the Rescue Aid Society in New York City, who assign their best agents, Bernard (Bob Newhart) and Miss Bianca (Eva Gabor), to the case. To save Cody and the rare, golden eagle, from the villainous McCleach, the pair fly to Australia, on a clumsy albatross (John Candy), and enlist the help of an adventurous kangaroo rat (Tristan Rogers) to help them find the missing boy. Meanwhile, Bernard must pluck up the courage to ask Miss Bianca to marry him… a feat this shy mouse finds to be even more challenging when they arrive in the Australian Outback.
One of the strongest themes which is woven throughout The Rescuers Down Under is love, and this theme is illustrated in two ways as the story unfolds.
The first thread of love elicited in the movie is expressed by Marahute, a beautiful golden eagle who guards a precious secret. She is the essence of maternal love. After a dramatic flight through the Australian skies with Cody (Adam Ryen), the young boy who rescues Marahute from a cruel poacher’s snare, Marahute returns to her nest and shows Cody her precious eggs. The pair form a special bond when they realize that they have both lost a parent… Cody lost his father and Marahute lost her mate, and the father of her chicks, when he was killed by McCleach. The golden feather that Marahute gives to Cody, signifies that she trusts him with her secret. Cody initially puts the golden feather on the babies when they are covering the eggs, but Marahute offers the feather to Cody, as a gift, and they seal their bond of friendship with a hug. When McCleach captures Cody, it is this same feather than tells the poacher that Cody knows where Marahute and her eggs are, because he shows Cody an identical golden feather, taken when he killed Marahute’s mate. When McCleach sets Cody free, he tells Cody that Marahute was killed and her eggs will die without their mother’s protection, but this is a trick to get the boy to lead him to the eggs. Cody returns to Marahute’s nest to protect the eggs, and he places another golden feather on the eggs, silently reaffirming his promise to her, that he would keep her precious secret from the poacher who murdered her mate. Marahute shows her love for Cody again when she saves him from going over the waterfall and following McCleach to certain death. She catches him on her back, much like she did the first time, when he freed her from the poacher’s snare on the cliff, and this time she takes Cody home and restores the missing boy to his mother.
Another way that love is represented in the story is found in the characters of Miss Bianca and Bernard, and how their partnership has deepened from being strictly professional, to more romantic, when they are having a romantic dinner together and Bernard attempts to propose to her. I DO appreciate though, that while poor Bernard spent the whole movie trying to pluck up the courage to propose to Bianca, we can clearly see that while Bianca is concerned about their mission and wants to leave immediately for Australia, and once there, she is charmed and impressed by Jake's handsome looks and chivalrous manner and charm and his prowess with the Australian wildlife, when it comes right down to it, Miss Bianca's heart clearly belongs to Bernard. When Bernard lands in the sticker bush, Bianca is the one to help him de-prickle himself. When they are captured with Marahute and Cody, Jake thought Miss Bianca was bluffing when she said Bernard would rescue them, but she tells him "You don't know Bernard like I do… he won't ever give up." She has faith that, despite the dire situation, Bernard will save them. And we see that her faith in Bernard is justified when Bernard protects Marahute's eggs from Joanna, by hiding them under the nest, and after he leaves Wilbur to protect the eggs, Bernard sets off, himself, to go and rescue Miss Bianca and the others....even using a wild boar to hitch a ride, rather than giving up, when he sees how far he has to go to catch up with the villain.
In comparing the two Rescuers movies, there is a marked difference in the animation style. In the first movie, the animation looked like watered down, colored in, rough pencil drawings and there was very little detail. The second movie possesses some of the most beautiful and creative work expressed in Disney animation. The environments (particularly in the Australian wilderness, which the animators created using photographs of the Australian landscape) can only be described as breathtaking, and the attention to detail, particularly in regard to the creative designs of the main protagonists and Marahute only serve to enhance the beauty of the movie. The two villains, Madame Medusa and Percival McCleach, while they are different genders, are otherwise identical; they are motivated primarily by greed, they crave what is not theirs to take, and they will go to extraordinary measures to achieve that which they desire. The peripheral characters in The Rescuers Down Under are by far a stronger faction than those in the original movie, particularly in the cases of Joanna, McCleach’s pet lizard and Wilbur, the clumsy, yet comical brother of Orville from the original movie.
While the initial reaction of The Rescuers Down Under was somewhat underwhelmed compared to the popularity and financial success of The Little Mermaid, this second jewel in the Disney Renaissance stands out for another reason altogether. One aspect that makes this movie truly unique is that The Rescuers Down Under is one of the only Disney sequels to not only surpass its original in the superior animation, character development, and storyline, but it is also the only Disney animated sequel, to date, to merit a place in the Disney animated canon.
As Disney movies go, I think The Rescuers Down Under is a unique addition to the Disney family. While it diverges from the fairy-tale atmosphere that is common in Disney films, the movie provides enough breath-taking adventure and tender romance to keep both children and adults entertained. I would highly recommend this movie to anyone who loves Disney as much as I do.
© 2025 Keriane Kellogg. All rights reserved.
Directors: Hendel Butoy, Mike Gabriel
Cast: Eva Gabor, Bob Newhart, Adam Ryen, George C. Scott, John Candy, Tristan Rogers, Frank Welker Wayne Robson, Bernard Fox, Ed Gilbert, Carla Meyer, Douglas Seale, Peter Firth, Billy Barty
Cody (Adam Ryen), a boy living in the Australian outback, frees a rare golden eagle from a poacher’s trap. When an evil poacher named McCleach (George C. Scott) kidnaps Cody to use as bait to catch the rare eagle, a group of local animals contacts the Rescue Aid Society in New York City, who assign their best agents, Bernard (Bob Newhart) and Miss Bianca (Eva Gabor), to the case. To save Cody and the rare, golden eagle, from the villainous McCleach, the pair fly to Australia, on a clumsy albatross (John Candy), and enlist the help of an adventurous kangaroo rat (Tristan Rogers) to help them find the missing boy. Meanwhile, Bernard must pluck up the courage to ask Miss Bianca to marry him… a feat this shy mouse finds to be even more challenging when they arrive in the Australian Outback.
One of the strongest themes which is woven throughout The Rescuers Down Under is love, and this theme is illustrated in two ways as the story unfolds.
The first thread of love elicited in the movie is expressed by Marahute, a beautiful golden eagle who guards a precious secret. She is the essence of maternal love. After a dramatic flight through the Australian skies with Cody (Adam Ryen), the young boy who rescues Marahute from a cruel poacher’s snare, Marahute returns to her nest and shows Cody her precious eggs. The pair form a special bond when they realize that they have both lost a parent… Cody lost his father and Marahute lost her mate, and the father of her chicks, when he was killed by McCleach. The golden feather that Marahute gives to Cody, signifies that she trusts him with her secret. Cody initially puts the golden feather on the babies when they are covering the eggs, but Marahute offers the feather to Cody, as a gift, and they seal their bond of friendship with a hug. When McCleach captures Cody, it is this same feather than tells the poacher that Cody knows where Marahute and her eggs are, because he shows Cody an identical golden feather, taken when he killed Marahute’s mate. When McCleach sets Cody free, he tells Cody that Marahute was killed and her eggs will die without their mother’s protection, but this is a trick to get the boy to lead him to the eggs. Cody returns to Marahute’s nest to protect the eggs, and he places another golden feather on the eggs, silently reaffirming his promise to her, that he would keep her precious secret from the poacher who murdered her mate. Marahute shows her love for Cody again when she saves him from going over the waterfall and following McCleach to certain death. She catches him on her back, much like she did the first time, when he freed her from the poacher’s snare on the cliff, and this time she takes Cody home and restores the missing boy to his mother.
Another way that love is represented in the story is found in the characters of Miss Bianca and Bernard, and how their partnership has deepened from being strictly professional, to more romantic, when they are having a romantic dinner together and Bernard attempts to propose to her. I DO appreciate though, that while poor Bernard spent the whole movie trying to pluck up the courage to propose to Bianca, we can clearly see that while Bianca is concerned about their mission and wants to leave immediately for Australia, and once there, she is charmed and impressed by Jake's handsome looks and chivalrous manner and charm and his prowess with the Australian wildlife, when it comes right down to it, Miss Bianca's heart clearly belongs to Bernard. When Bernard lands in the sticker bush, Bianca is the one to help him de-prickle himself. When they are captured with Marahute and Cody, Jake thought Miss Bianca was bluffing when she said Bernard would rescue them, but she tells him "You don't know Bernard like I do… he won't ever give up." She has faith that, despite the dire situation, Bernard will save them. And we see that her faith in Bernard is justified when Bernard protects Marahute's eggs from Joanna, by hiding them under the nest, and after he leaves Wilbur to protect the eggs, Bernard sets off, himself, to go and rescue Miss Bianca and the others....even using a wild boar to hitch a ride, rather than giving up, when he sees how far he has to go to catch up with the villain.
In comparing the two Rescuers movies, there is a marked difference in the animation style. In the first movie, the animation looked like watered down, colored in, rough pencil drawings and there was very little detail. The second movie possesses some of the most beautiful and creative work expressed in Disney animation. The environments (particularly in the Australian wilderness, which the animators created using photographs of the Australian landscape) can only be described as breathtaking, and the attention to detail, particularly in regard to the creative designs of the main protagonists and Marahute only serve to enhance the beauty of the movie. The two villains, Madame Medusa and Percival McCleach, while they are different genders, are otherwise identical; they are motivated primarily by greed, they crave what is not theirs to take, and they will go to extraordinary measures to achieve that which they desire. The peripheral characters in The Rescuers Down Under are by far a stronger faction than those in the original movie, particularly in the cases of Joanna, McCleach’s pet lizard and Wilbur, the clumsy, yet comical brother of Orville from the original movie.
While the initial reaction of The Rescuers Down Under was somewhat underwhelmed compared to the popularity and financial success of The Little Mermaid, this second jewel in the Disney Renaissance stands out for another reason altogether. One aspect that makes this movie truly unique is that The Rescuers Down Under is one of the only Disney sequels to not only surpass its original in the superior animation, character development, and storyline, but it is also the only Disney animated sequel, to date, to merit a place in the Disney animated canon.
As Disney movies go, I think The Rescuers Down Under is a unique addition to the Disney family. While it diverges from the fairy-tale atmosphere that is common in Disney films, the movie provides enough breath-taking adventure and tender romance to keep both children and adults entertained. I would highly recommend this movie to anyone who loves Disney as much as I do.
© 2025 Keriane Kellogg. All rights reserved.