Duchess and her three kittens are enjoying the high life with their devoted human mistress until the wicked butler Edgar, with his eyes on a big inheritance, decides to dope them and get them out of the picture. How can these fragile creatures cope in the unfamiliar countryside and the meaner streets of Paris? Only by meeting the irrepressible alley cat O'Malley, a rough diamond with romance in his heart. After they get a taste of the wide dangerous world, he guides them home, and Edgar gets his just desserts at the wrong end of a horse. As always, it's really the voices rather than the animation that are the heart of the Disney magic: Phil Harris is brilliant as O'Malley, Eva Gabor as Duchess is... well... Eva Gabor; but perhaps the most memorable turns are by Pat Buttram and George Lindsay, who turn the old hounds Napoleon and Lafayette into a couple of bumbling Southern-fried rednecks. Their scenes with Edgar, and the musical numbers with Scat Cat and his cool-dude band, are classic. Most striking about seeing The Aristocats now is how deeply Disney's style of animation has changed since this was at the cutting edge in 1970. Perhaps the nostalgic, dated feel are just a result of being plonked down in Belle Epoque Paris, but the illustrations are fussier (a pity) and the animation and overall pace much less frenetic (sometimes a relief) than in more recent efforts such as Aladdin. —Richard Farr

Imaginatively rendered but slightly chilly, this 1951 Disney adaptation of the Lewis Carroll classic is also appropriately surreal. Alice (voiced by Kathryn Beaumont) has all the anticipated experiences: shrinking and growing, meeting the White Rabbit, having tea with the Mad Hatter, etc. Characterization is very strong, and the Disney team worked hard to bring screen personality to Carroll's eccentric creations. For a Disney film, however, it seems more the self-satisfied sum of its inventiveness than a truly engaging experience. —Tom Keogh

Journey to the center of an animated feature with Disney's ingeniously engineered Special Edition. Taking a cue from The Matrix and Moulin Rouge, the commentary track by the directors and producer is enriched with an optional "Visual Commentary" feature, which whisks the viewers into behind the scenes featurettes on key sequences. Choose your own level of interaction in the second supplemental disc. "Tour" a comprehensive two-hour documentary with peeks at the wealth of additional materials you can "Explore" by theme or "File" through by topic. Among them: scores of design galleries, four cut sequences of varying completeness (including the fully animated original opening scene), a mythic mock history of the legendary "Shepherd's Journal" (complete with sample pages), and an Atlantean language primer by creator Mark Okrund. It's a journey almost as involved as Milo's, but a lot less tiring. —Sean Axmaker

The legend continues in Disney's ALADDIN: THE RETURN OF JAFAR, the second movie in Aladdin's magical saga! When Jafar's last wish was granted, he became the most powerful genie of all. But it came with a price — entrapment in a magic lamp! Now he has escaped and he has only one thing on his mind: revenge against Aladdin! A thrilling new adventure begins as everyone teams up against this evil sorcerer. From battling thieves on flying horses to dodging flames inside an exploding lava pit, it is up to Aladdin — with Princess Jasmine, Abu, Carpet, and Genie by his side — to save the kingdom once and for all! Get ready to share all the magic, music, and mystery of ALADDIN: THE RETURN OF JAFAR — with five showstopping songs and exciting new bonus features!

Don't be fooled by the title. Rather than 102, there are 4 reasons to like this sequel to the successful live-action remake of Disney's animated classic. There are the 101 spotted pooches, Glenn Close back in fine form as Cruella De Vil, Oddball—the spotless dalmation pup—and Waddlesworth, a parrot who thinks he's a rottweiler (and is voiced by Monty Python's Eric Idle). There are just as many reasons to be disappointed. Like most sequels, the story line is virtually a rewrite of the first, the secondary casting isn't as interesting, the dialogue merely serves to move the plot along, and the third act substitutes mean-spiritedness for comedy. After a period of rehabilitation, Cruella has returned to her old tricks. Once again, she simply must have a spotted coat and will go to any lengths to get ahold of the 102 dalmatians needed to make one with a hood. She sets her sights on the pups owned by her probation officer, Chloe (Alice Evans), and the owner of a local animal shelter, Kevin (Ioan Gruffudd of Horatio Hornblower). Her servant, Alonso (Tim McInnerny), and flamboyant furrier Monsieur Le Pelt (Gerard Depardieu, in one ridiculous outfit after another) are drafted to aid in her quest. It should come as no surprise that Chloe and Kevin fall in love, Oddball helps to save the day, and Cruella is defeated. Children should enjoy the animal high jinks, but adults are less likely to be enamored by this perfectly competent, but relatively charmless affair. —Kathleen C. Fennessy

This 1949 Disney feature has never been available on video in its original form until now. The 68-minute film contains two shorts: The Wind in the Willows and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The former is a lively version of Kenneth Grahame's book of animal adventures, including Mr. Toad, a rambunctious sort with a passion for motorcars. Basil Rathbone narrates the story. Sleepy Hollow is the Washington Irving story of a stuffy schoolmaster and his ability to win the love of the fair Katrina from the brutish Brom Van Brunt. Many fans will see a resemblance to Disney's masterpiece created some 40 years later, Beauty and the Beast, in style and story. The end is still scary enough to send youngsters under the table. Bing Crosby supplies the narration, character voices, and songs. The opening number in a library including two stories has been included in this good-looking restoration. The shorts were made in Disney's prime, a year before Cinderella, and the look is wondrous. The exaggeration of Ichabod's skinny frame and his slumping horse is a glorious example. —Doug Thomas

Huckleberry Finn's age has been scaled down in this 1993 Disney film in order to accommodate star Elijah Wood's young years at the time. But that's not the only concession Mark Twain's great American novel must make to Disney revisionism. Wood's Huck, as adapted for the screen by writer-director Stephen Sommers, is all rascal and only nominally a philosopher, which takes a lot of the soul out of Twain's extraordinary story about Huck's enlightenment while traveling with the slave Jim (Courtney B. Vance) along the Mississippi river. Big chunks of the journey are also minimized in significance, and not just for the sake of storytelling economy. Jason Robards Jr. and Robbie Coltrane brighten things up, but overall this is an unnecessarily simplified version of an important story. —Tom Keogh