It's Tough to Be a Bird (1969)

Name: It's Tough to Be a Bird
Genre: Animation, Documentary
Released: 1969-12-10
Duration: 21 min
Rating: 6.2
Cast: Richard Bakalyan, Ruth Buzzi, Paul Frees, Ward Kimball, John Emerson

It's Tough to Be a Bird (1969), directed by Ward Kimball, starring Richard Bakalyan and Ruth Buzzi.

12/10/1969 BR Animation and Documentary 21m

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Synopsis

Part cartoon and part documentary, this film offers a humorous look at birds and the ways people perceive them.

Ward KimballDirector, Producer, Writer
Walt DisneyProducer
Ted BermanWriter

About the film

It's Tough to Be a Bird is a 1969 American animated educational short film directed by Ward Kimball and produced by Walt Disney Productions. The short won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject, Cartoons at the 42nd Academy Awards in 1970 and was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film in 1971. This was the last animated short film produced by Disney to win an Academy Award until Paperman (2012), the last animated short film distributed by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution to win such an award until Pixar's Geri's Game (1997) and the final animated cartoon short released by Disney in the golden age of American animation.

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Summary

In the short, a red bird (voiced by Richard Bakalyan) explains how birds have contributed to human culture, even as people often try to kill them. He claims this may be because humans were jealous that birds can fly but people cannot, mentioning the legend of Icarus and featured films of early unsuccessful flying machines.

In Disney's D-TV in the 1980s, clips from this short were set to Bobby Day's cover of "Rockin' Robin".

Cast

Ruth Buzzi as Soprano

Richard Bakalyan as M.C. Bird

John Emerson as Bird Fancier

Jim Swain as Bird Fancier

Ann Lord as Bird Fancier

Hank Schloss as Bird Fancier

Walter Perkins as Bird Fancier

Rolf Darbo as Bird Fancier

Ward Kimball as Bird Fancier (uncredited)

References

External links

It's Tough to Be a Bird at IMDb

It's Tough to Be a Bird at Disney A to Z

Text from It's Tough to Be a Bird on Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It's_Tough_to_Be_a_Bird

Trivia

It premiered on December 10, 1969, a Wednesday.
It won 1 award(s) and received 2 nomination(s) on record at Wikidata — Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film among them.
This film's quiz has 10 questions — enough to play more than once without repeats.