How Many of These Classic Disney Movies Do You Know?

When Hollywood films make the jump to foreign markets, they don't always keep their original titles. Name changes can happen for all sorts of reasons, from compromises in translation to marketing strategies. Disney's "The Mighty Ducks," for instance, is known simply as "Champions" in Australia. Distributors thought moviegoers would think the film was about actual ducks, so they gave it a more obvious sports-themed (and slightly spoilery) title.

Hayley Mills did double duty in Disney's 1961 version of "The Parent Trap," playing two characters and even duetting with herself on the song "Let's Get Together." In the film, Mills plays twins Susan Evers and Sharon McKendrick, who discover they're sisters after meeting by chance at summer camp. Hollywood later remade "The Parent Trap" in 1998, this time casting a young up-and-coming redhead named Lindsay Lohan in the twin roles.

Without knowing the Cantonese language, audiences might miss the pun in the fake name, Ping Fa, used in “Mulan” (1998). Her surname, Fa, means flower, and Ping means vase or pot. Combined, they become a Cantonese phrase for a feminine man or an attractive woman.

In the history of the Academy Awards, only three animated films have ever been nominated for Best Picture. The first was Disney's 1991 movie "Beauty and the Beast," which went up against "The Silence of the Lambs," "Bugsy," "JFK," and "The Prince of Tides" at the 1992 Oscars. Perhaps not surprisingly, it lost to "The Silence of the Lambs" — but it did take home two other trophies, for Best Original Score and Best Original Song.

Walt Disney was the undisputed king of animated entertainment, but his company started making live-action films as far back as the 1950s. After World War II, Disney was in financial straits and decided to explore new ways of making money. The first live-action movie was a 1950 adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic "Treasure Island" starring Bobby Driscoll and Robert Newton.

Disney has tapped popular singers to write music for its movies before — Elton John famously penned the songs for "The Lion King" in 1994, to name one notable example — but Phil Collins' approach to the "Tarzan" soundtrack was unique. Rather than write tunes for the characters to sing, as is typical of Disney's animated films, Collins performed most of the songs himself (or with guest artists), making Collins something of a narrator throughout the film.

“A Whole New World” is the only Disney song to win the prestigious Grammy for Best Original Song. Alan Menken composed the music, while Tim Rice penned the lyrics. While Brad Kane and Lea Salonga recorded Aladdin and Princess Jasmine’s voices in the film, a different version of the song featuring Peabo Bryson and Regina Belle was released as a single and reached no. 1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart in 1993.

“Dumbo” was released in 1941. Both “Fantasia” and “Pinocchio” had initially made losses because of WWII, so Disney hoped that a lower-budget movie could reverse the company’s fortunes. The story was simpler, fewer special effects were used, and the running time was kept to a brisk 64 minutes. The gamble paid off, and “Dumbo” was a huge commercial success.

“Pinocchio” (1940) was Disney’s second animated feature. The film was the first animated feature to win a competitive Oscar ("Snow White" was given an honorary award for innovation), taking home two awards for Original Score and Original Song for “When You Wish Upon a Star.” A category for Best Animated Feature was finally introduced at the Oscars in 2002, with Dreamworks’ “Shrek” taking the prize.

Cinderella sings this song at the very beginning of Disney's 1950 animated classic, after she has just woken up from what she describes as "a lovely dream." As she sings — "A dream is a wish your heart makes / When you're fast asleep / In dreams, you will lose your heartaches / Whatever you wish for, you keep" — several birds and mice gather at her bedside, entranced by her words and her voice.

English writer and journalist Rudyard Kipling was born in India, which inspired much of his later writing. “The Jungle Book” was published in 1894 and is a collection of short stories set in the Indian jungle featuring a lost child raised by wolves, Mowgli, as the main character. Disney’s version brings comedy and music to the story, making for a more family-friendly film.

The concept sketches for Ariel were based on Alyssa Milano, then a child star well-known from her role on TV’s “Who’s the Boss.” Legendary Disney animator Glen Keane used photos of a young Milano to perfect Ariel’s features, but Milano herself was totally unaware she had inspired Ariel’s facial structure and likeness until many years later, when she was asked to host the documentary “The Making of the Little Mermaid.”

Disney has adapted a number of Hans Christian Anderson’s tales for its films, including 1989’s “The Little Mermaid.” “Frozen” is loosely based on the story of “The Snow Queen,” in which best friends are torn apart after splinters of troll-glass corrupt the boy’s eyes and heart. Walt Disney himself had reportedly dreamed of adapting the tale since 1937.

The Sherman Brothers, who wrote “That’s What Friends Are For,” originally wanted the Beatles to sing and do the voice work for the vultures in the 1967 Disney classic “The Jungle Book.” They even went so far as to model the vultures after the band in looks and accent. Alas, the Beatles declined, and in the end the vultures weren’t voiced by a band at all — just four guys putting on Liverpool accents.

“Beauty and the Beast” (1991) was the first Disney film to feature a brunette princess. Belle was original in other ways too; she was super smart and loved books. In other Disney hair firsts, Ariel from “The Little Mermaid” (1989) was originally blonde. However, since the recent film “Splash!” featured a blonde mermaid, Ariel got a makeover, becoming Disney’s first red-haired princess.

Walt Disney wanted to create a concert feature unlike any film that had been made before, and 1940’s “Fantasia” was the result. He persuaded superstar conductor Leopold Stokowski to collaborate on the movie and conduct the orchestra. Disney also developed new sound technology known as Fantasound, which was installed in over a dozen movie theaters to do justice to the movie’s incredible score.

Casting a dog as a nursemaid for three children may seem very on brand for Disney, but the character of Nana in "Peter Pan" actually predates the 1953 animated film. Author and playwright J.M. Barrie wrote Nana as a dog in his original 1904 play, "Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up," as well as in its subsequent 1911 novelization. He reportedly based the character on his pet Newfoundland, Luath.

Most people refer to the main antagonists in Disney's 1950 animated classic "Cinderella" as simply the wicked stepmother and evil stepsisters. But the characters do, in fact, have names. The wicked stepmother is Lady Tremaine, and the evil stepsisters are Anastasia and Drizella. Introduced in the prologue to the movie as "a woman of good family," Lady Tremaine showed her true nature as jealous and cruel only after Cinderella's father passed away.

The character of Lady was inspired by story artist Joe Grant’s English Springer Spaniel, who had also struggled to adjust to a new baby in the house, while Tramp was based on a character from the short story “Happy Dan, the Cynical Dog.” The ideas were combined and put into development, but the artists decided to draw Lady as a cute American Cocker Spaniel to contrast with Tramp, a loveable mutt.

Based on the beloved fairy tale of the same name, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” premiered in 1937 at Los Angeles’ Carthay Circle Theater. Some doubted that children would sit through a feature-length cartoon, but Walt Disney was passionate about the project, and even refinanced his house to help pay for production. The film was an immediate critical and commercial success, confirming that Disney’s future lay in animated movies.