With its exhilarating action sequences, Walt Disney Pictures' The Rescuers Down Under challenges the adventure films of Spielberg and Lucas and confirms the special power of animation to present extravagant fantasies on screen.

| Dec 15, 2024

The storyline for the 29th full-length animated feature from Walt Disney Pictures is nothing spectacular, but its depiction of the Australian outback is a visual treat.

| Dec 15, 2024

It's a far better piece of animation than the dismal Oliver and Company of 1988 and last year's smartly conceived but indifferently executed Little Mermaid. Butoy and Gabriel obviously love their medium, the first Disney directors to do so in years.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Dec 15, 2024

[The Rescuers Down Under] stands very well on its own as a mixture of engaging schmaltz and some remarkably zany slapstick humor that makes you think at times that the spirit of the Marx Brothers has taken control of the movie.

| Dec 15, 2024

The Rescuers Down Under is no Little Mermaid. It is adequate children's entertainment, though, and adults won't mind sitting through it.

| Original Score: 6/10 | Dec 15, 2024

The sequel, I'm afraid, isn't much of an improvement. It's certainly watchable, which is more than could be said for DuckTales: The Movie, Disney's other cartoon feature this year.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Dec 15, 2024

[The original] The Rescuers was one of the few successes of the bad times. The Rescuers Down Under comes along when Disney needs no one's help in staking its unassailable claim on the nation's children.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Dec 15, 2024

It's great to have a movie that teaches kids about ecology in a way that's so much fun they won't even know they're in school.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 15, 2024

The Rescuers Down Under is not only a worthy follow-up to [The Little] Mermaid, but also features some of the most amazing animation ever to come out of the studio.

| Original Score: 8/10 | Dec 15, 2024

The dialogue is snappy, the characters amusing, the flying sequences are exhilarating, and there's a realistic sense of scale -- of being a vulnerable speck of life in the immensity of the rugged Outback.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Dec 15, 2024

The film is chock-full of laughs and thrills for the kids, but it also wittily nudges adult audience members. But the sweet Disney charm pervades.

| Dec 15, 2024

Unlike The Rescuers of 1977, which was flat and negligible, this sequel features full-bodied images and a number of distinctive, memorable characters. It also features an adventure plot that serves as a wry, environmentally conscious allegory.

| Dec 15, 2024

The animation is splendid, and the script and characterisation shows definite signs that present-day children are sharper than of yore to appreciate a good irony and even satire when they see it.

| Dec 15, 2024

[George C. Scott] huffs and puffs and blows the roof off the part of villainous poacher Percival McLeach. It's Scott's best role in years.

| Dec 15, 2024

This is a sequel to the 1977 Disney cartoon, and vastly superior... The craftsmanship is of a high standard, including some breathtaking flying sequences; the message immaculately Green.

| Dec 14, 2024

A Crocodile Dundee / Indiana Jones hybrid that recycles the animals-are-more-humane-than-humans theme with aplomb. What's more, the animation sets a new standard in children's films.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Dec 14, 2024

A worthy diversion for the very young, but against their more venerable stablemates -- notably DuckTales -- The Rescuers's identification/memorableness factor remains second division.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 13, 2009

This sort-of sequel to the 1977 hit The Rescuers boasts reasonably solid production values and fine character voices. Too bad they're set against such a mediocre story that adults may duck.

| Mar 26, 2009

As for the animation, computer technology invests contemporary features with sometimes breathtaking dynamism, but outback flora being what it is, this isn't the most colourful Disney movie.

| Jun 24, 2006

The film's direction, by Hendel Butoy and Mike Gabriel, is spectacularly inventive even when not fully appropriate to either the film's subject or the very young viewers it can be expected to attract.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 30, 2004