Tarzan is a 1999 American animated musical adventure film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures on June 18, 1999. The 37th film in the Walt Disney Animated Classics, it is based on the story Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs, and is the only major motion picture version of the story Tarzan property to be animated.
It was the last bona fide hit before the Disney slump of the early 2000s grossing $171,091,819 domestically and $448,191,819 worldwide, outgrossing its predecessors Hercules (1997) and Mulan (1998). At the time of its release, its production budget of $130 million made it the most expensive animated film ever made, until topped by Disney's own $140 million Treasure Planet in 2002. It was also the first Disney animated feature to open at #1 since Pocahontas. This was the last major box office success of the Disney Renaissance.
In the 19th century, an English couple and their infant son escape a burning ship, ending up on land near uncharted rainforests off the coast of Africa. The couple craft themselves a treehouse from their ship's wreckage, but are subsequently killed by Sabor, a rogue leopardess. Kala, a female gorilla who recently lost her own child to Sabor, hears the cries of the orphaned human infant and finds him in the ruined treehouse. Though she is attacked by Sabor, Kala and the baby manage to escape. Kala takes the baby back to the gorilla troop to raise as her own, despite her mate Kerchak's disapproval. Kala raises the human child, naming him Tarzan. Though he befriends other gorillas in the troop and other animals, including the young female gorilla Terk and the paranoid male elephant Tantor, Tarzan finds himself unable to keep up with them, so he takes great efforts to improve himself. As a young man, Tarzan is able to kill Sabor with his crude spear and protect the troop, earning Kerchak's reluctant respect.
stephen: "cut me down and count the rings inside." we are
going nowhere.
justin: day after day, hopes not in vain. until we could
set the past on fire, to wipe the flames from your face,