"The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Cut" Screening and Discussion

"The Thief and the Cobbler" was animator Richard Williams' passion project that he worked on for 30 years. When he finally got the chance to finish it, he went overbudget and the movie was taken away from him.

Another director turned Williams' footage into a more conventional animated movie, "The Princess and the Cobbler." It flopped, in no small part because Disney had released a similar film, "Aladdin." Another version of "The Thief and the Cobbler," called "Arabian Knight," was released two years later and also flopped.

Fans of animation have made several attempts to complete "The Thief and the Cobbler" in line with Richard Williams' original vision. We will be watching the latest, "The Thief and the Cobbler Recobbled Cut Mark 5." It will be strange: Shots of gorgeous, colorful animation will suddenly switch to primitive storyboards. But this is the Weird Movie Club, after all.

I'll get to the library around 1:30 p.m. and try to set everything up in time for a 2 p.m. start. Get there early so you don't miss a minute. The library closes at 5, so we'll have to wrap up discussion before then. Discussions tend to last no more than about half an hour, but maybe it will last longer this time if we break into smaller groups and make it feel less like a classroom.

It's all free. We'll be in the Andy Boss Community Room on the 4th floor of the George Latimer Public Library in downtown St. Paul.

Street parking is possible, but you might consider using the light rail. A great place to park and ride is the Western Avenue stop of the Green Line. There's always parking on Aurora Avenue, one street south of University.

And feel free to sitemail me to recommend another movie for a future meeting. It would be great if you wanted to host and lead discussion too. You can go by the official list from the website 366 Weird Movies (366 Weird Movies + Apocrypha: streaming info last updated 5/24/21 - Google Sheets) or suggest something else.