The Tortoise and The Hare - Film Adaptations

Film Adaptations

There have been a number of film versions of the fable, although some have taken liberties with the original story line. There were early animated cartoons in France (1920) and the US (1921). The fable was adapted into a Silly Symphonies cartoon also titled The Tortoise and the Hare by Walt Disney Productions in 1935 which was followed in 1941 by the Merrie Melodies sequel Tortoise Wins by a Hare and two others of decreasingly relevant significance. Encyclopædia Britannica Films followed with a dramatized version of Aesop's fable starring live animals, including an owl, a fox, a goose, a rooster, a raccoon and a hare. This was a 1947 production in black and white with narrated voice-over.

In 1952 the model animator Ray Harryhausen began a version of the fable before moving over to more lucrative work on monster movies. Young enthusiasts Seamus Walsh and Mark Caballero later helped Harryhausen complete "The Story of the Tortoise and the Hare", having refurbished the original puppets and, under Harryhausen's guidance, completed the film in 2002. A feature in this is that the hare drops off to sleep as a result of taking a big meal near the end of the race, so allowing the tortoise to win. The same situation had appeared in Georges de la Grandière's 1960s cartoon version of the fable, Le Lièvre et la tortue.