'' is an
Animated Feature produced by
Walt Disney Studios and released to theaters on
October 5 ,
1949 by
RKO Radio Pictures . It is the eleventh
Animated Feature in the
Disney Animated Features Canon . This film was the final of Disney's
1940s "
Package Films " (feature films comprised of two or more
Short Subject s instead of a single feature-length story). Beginning with the next animated feature release, ''
Cinderella '', his studio would return to the feature-length stories that low income and
World War II had caused a drought of during the 1940s.
There are two segments in the film both based upon popular works of literature:
- The adventures of Mr. Toad from Kenneth Grahame 's '' The Wind In The Willows '' (narrated by Basil Rathbone ). In this story, J. Thaddeus Toad, the proprietor of Toad Hall, is prone to fads, such as the newfangled motor car. As a result, this desire for the very latest lands him in much trouble with the wrong crowd, and it is up to his friends, Mole, Water Rat, and Angus MacBadger to save him from himself.
- Chinese : ''伊老师与小蟾蜍大历险''
- Dutch : ''De Avonturen van Ichabod en Mr. Pad''
- Finnish : ''Ichabod ja Herra. Konna''
- )
- German : ''Die Abenteur von Ichabod und Taddäus Kröte''
- Italian : ''Le Avventure di Ichabod e Signore Toad''
- Portuguese : ''Dois Sujeitos Fabulosos'' (later ''As Aventuras de Ichabod e o Sr. Sapo'')
- ); ''Dos Personajes Fabulosos'' ( Latin America )
- Swedish : ''Det Susar I Säven och Ichabods Äventyr''
- ''The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad'' was not seen in its entirety for many years after its initial theatrical release, the film's two component stories instead being separated for Television and Home Video . The full feature was, however, eventually released on DVD .
- Evidently, the only reason these two stories are linked together is the fact that their main characters are "prone to disaster".
- The Chase sequence in the "Ichabod" segment is considered by many film critics to be some of the most vivid and frightening animation ever done by the studio. With its frenetic pacing and demonic imagery the sequence has often been held up as an example of the Fear element that was pervasive in many of Disney's animated films.
- In 2000 the Walt Disney Classics Collection, which is a collection of officially released Disney statue and pin merchandise, released a 3,500 limited edition set of the two main Sleepy Hollow characters Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman. The figures were originally sold for $695 together as a set. The pair have since been retired from the collection and its value has risen dramatically each year.
