''Frank and Ollie'' is a 1995 documentary film about the life and careers of Frank Thomas and

Ollie Johnston Oliver Martin Johnston Jr. (October 31, 1912 – April 14, 2008) was an American motion picture animator. He was one of Disney's Nine Old Men, and the last surviving at the time of his death from natural causes. He was recognized by The Walt ...

, two chief animators who had worked at

Walt Disney Animation Studios Walt Disney Animation Studios (WDAS), sometimes shortened to Disney Animation, is an American animation studio that creates animated features and short films for The Walt Disney Company. The studio's current production logo features a scene fro ...

from its early years until their retirement in the late 1970s. It was directed, produced and written by Theodore Thomas, Frank Thomas' son. A number of other important figures in the animation business are also interviewed about Frank and Ollie's influence of modern animation, and about their personal friendship.

Release

The film was first shown at the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...

in January, 1995, before gaining a limited theatrical release in October.

Home Media

The film was very obscure, having received a limited theatrical and VHS release. However, in 2003, the film was released on a Special Edition DVD, including such features as commentary, 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound, a behind-the-scenes

featurette In the American film industry, a featurette is a kind of film that is shorter than a full-length feature, but longer than a short film. The term may refer to either of two types of content: a shorter film or a companion film. Medium-length film ...

, footage of Frank and Ollie's very first animations made at Disney, and some of Frank and Ollie's home movies as well as some scenes of Ollie's

live steam Live steam is steam under pressure, obtained by heating water in a boiler. The steam is used to operate stationary or moving equipment. A live steam machine or device is one powered by steam, but the term is usually reserved for those that ar ...

train, excerpted from a Disney TV show.

Streaming

''Frank and Ollie'' is currently available to watch on-demand via

Disney+ The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and interest of an audience or gives pleasure and deligh ...

Summary

The film primarily consists of Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston's anecdotes of their careers as

animator An animator is an artist who creates multiple images, known as frames, which give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film, television, and video gam ...

s during their long tenure at Walt Disney Studios, beginning with their hiring a couple of years before the release of ''

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" is a 19th-century German fairy tale that is today known widely across the Western world. The Brothers Grimm published it in 1812 in the first edition of their collection ''Grimms' Fairy Tales'' and numbered as Ta ...

''. They talk about the successes and difficulties of the Walt Disney studios throughout their careers, including the production of Disney's early works such as ''

Pinocchio Pinocchio ( , ) is a fictional character and the protagonist of the children's novel ''The Adventures of Pinocchio'' (1883) by Italian writer Carlo Collodi of Florence, Tuscany. Pinocchio was carved by a woodcarver named Geppetto in a Tuscan vil ...

'' and ''

Fantasia Fantasia International Film Festival (also known as Fantasia-fest, FanTasia, and Fant-Asia) is a film festival that has been based mainly in Montreal since its founding in 1996. Regularly held in July of each year, it is valued by both hardcore ...

'', decrease in business due to

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the unexpected death of

Walt Disney Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...

in 1966, and the importance of ''

The Jungle Book ''The Jungle Book'' (1894) is a collection of stories by the English author Rudyard Kipling. Most of the characters are animals such as Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear, though a principal character is the boy or "man-cub" Mowgli, ...

s success in 1967. These anecdotes are punctuated by archival footage from various Disney films, as well as interviews with contemporary Disney animators, animation historians, and interviews with Frank and Ollie's wives. Footage of Frank and Ollie's daily lives at their nearby homes in

La Cañada Flintridge, California La Cañada Flintridge, commonly known as "La Cañada" (Spanish for "The Canyon"), is a city in the foothills of the Verdugo Mountains in Los Angeles County, California. Located in the Crescenta Valley, in the western edge of Southern Califor ...

is also featured. Periodically in the film, Frank or Ollie (usually Ollie) will act out or describe a scene from a Disney film that they animated, and then show the scene from the film. This demonstrates the importance of acting in animation. Several of their anecdotes were also about how other animators did their scenes. The film also talks about

Disney's Nine Old Men Disney's Nine Old Men were Walt Disney Productions' core animators, some of whom later became directors, who created some of Disney's most famous animated cartoons, from ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' (1937) onward to ''The Rescuers'' (1977 ...

, the senior staff at Walt Disney Studios. Ollie Johnston's beloved model railroad and the book '' Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life'', written by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, also feature prominently in the film.

Reception

Reviews were generally positive, with a score of 88% from

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

References

External links

Official website of Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston

''Frank and Ollie''
at

Disney.com disney.com is a website operated by Disney Digital Network, a division of The Walt Disney Company, that promotes various Disney properties such as films, television shows, and theme park resorts, and offers entertainment content intended for child ...

*
''Frank and Ollie'' on DisneyPlus
* {{Walt Disney Animation Studios 1995 films 1990s American animated films 1990s biographical films 1995 documentary films American biographical films Documentary films about visual artists Documentary films about film directors and producers Walt Disney Pictures films Disney documentary films Documentary films about animation Films about Disney Films directed by Theodore Thomas (filmmaker) 1990s English-language films