When I was younger, I did anything my brother did. My brother was getting older and no longer had the patience to constantly watch movies with me. He preferred cartoons over the old movies our parents would play on VHS cassettes, so naturally, I also watched cartoons. But no matter how many I sat through, I much preferred the old movies over the shows he picked, so I often tried to convince him to watch them with me. Finally, I persuaded him to watch a new movie with me: a 1970s Disney film called “The Aristocats.”
That choice led to being a huge fan.
The movie follows a cat and her three kittens who are thrown out by the selfish butler Edgar, because his employer Madame Adelaide gives her cats everything in her will. On their journey to venture back to the house, the four meet an alley cat who helps them get back to Madame and ends up as part of the family.
All three kittens — Marie with a white coat, Berlioz with brown fur and Toulouse the ginger — were adorably cute together, perfectly displaying playful sibling spats, while also highlighting the protective nature of siblings. My immediate admiration was for the orange kitten Toulouse, the oldest of the three kittens.
His obsession with being an alley cat — the complete opposite of the beloved housecat he was — had me hooked from the start. The way he would pounce around with tricks and mischievous hissing had young me infatuated. He is the reason that, if I were to get a kitten, I would want it to be an orange cat.
When I had the time in elementary school, I watched “The Aristocats” almost every month. But now that my time is much more limited, I take my annual dose of the retro movie each summer. To add to the sentimentalism, I rewatch the movie on my dad’s VHS TV, in the same room I first watched it with my brother.
Although I have a soft spot for old Disney movies with animal protagonists, “The Aristocats” is my all-time favorite, along with “The Fox and the Hound” as close runners-up. After 20 years from when my dad first bought it, the VHS TV has faded and is no longer as clear as it once was, but the movie playing on it and the memories that came with it remain vibrant.
