An American Tail

An American Tail is a 1986 American animated children's film directed by Don Bluth and written by Judy Freudberg and Tony Geiss. It stars the voices of Cathianne Blore, Dom DeLuise, John Finnegan, Phillip Glasser, Amy Green, Madeline Kahn, Pat Musick, Nehemiah Persoff, Christopher Plummer, Neil Ross, Will Ryan, Hal Smith, and Erica Yohn. Set in the late 19th century, the story follows the Mousekewitzes, a family of Russian-Jewish mice emigrating from the Russian Empire to the United States for freedom. Fievel, the youngest of the Mousekewitz family, gets lost and must find a way to reunite with them.

Production on An American Tail commenced in December 1984 and was originally conceived as a television special; executive producer Steven Spielberg felt it had potential as a feature film, and asked Bluth to "make [him] something pretty like [he] did in NIMH." The film was animated at Sullivan Bluth Studios, with James Horner composing the film's score and writing original songs.

An American Tail was theatrically released in the United States on November 21, 1986, by Universal Pictures. It received mixed reviews from critics and was a commercial success, grossing $85 million worldwide on a $9 million budget. The success spawned a franchise, including a sequel, a television series, and two sequels released on home video.