Friday, September 21, 2018

The Three Lives of Thomasina (1963)


Buena Vista Distribution
Directed by Don Chaffey
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(DVD, Walt Disney)

Veterinarian Patrick McGoohan struggles to convince the locals in a small village in Scotland that his scientific approach to treating animals is effective. Their suspicions are confirmed when his own daughter's cat dies while he is busy treating a wounded service dog. His daughter is devastated and refuses to even talk to her father any more. Meanwhile, the cat enters some kind of strange Egyptian cat heaven and is sent back to its body, where it is found by a friendly woman who lives in the woods. She is believed to be a witch by the local children, but they regularly bring her wounded animals to nurse back to health. She wins over McGoohan with her empathy and tenderness towards the animals, and their budding romance comes to fruition when his daughter falls ill. Disney drama does not quite come together, exploring complex themes such as loss of faith while trying to appeal to kids with cute animals. It's hard to take seriously in regards to the former with that cat heaven scene, and kids are likely to be upset by the melancholic tone and bored by the ruminations over faith and death. 

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