The Thief and the Cobbler

The Thief and the Cobbler (1993) is a hand-drawn fantasy you can watch online on iFILM. Atop the tallest minaret of the Golden City spin three golden orbs. Lose them and the kingdom falls. Prophecy says only a simple soul with a pure heart can save it.

That soul is Tack, a quiet shoemaker who barely speaks. Around him swirl a wordless, glitter-obsessed thief, Princess Yum Yum who falls for Tack and rescues him from the gallows, and the sinister vizier ZigZag, voiced with oily relish by Vincent Price. When the orbs are stolen, Tack and the princess set out to recover them while a one-eyed tyrant's army marches on the city. Matthew Broderick and Jennifer Beals round out the cast.

The real star is the drawing. Director Richard Williams, the animator behind Who Framed Roger Rabbit, chased this film for nearly three decades and never got to finish his cut — the studio seized the project and assembled its own. Even unfinished, it's some of the most dizzying hand animation ever put to cels, with patterns that bend perspective in front of your eyes. One for people who love animation as craft, not just plot. Stream The Thief and the Cobbler (1993) online on iFILM.