She didn't known her recordings had been sent to Disney, and they finally chose her because they found she was more fitting to Pocahontas than the other four girls nominated. Four girls were initially chosen to try out for Pocahontas' role, and Gihan was only supposed to guide and help them. Gihan El-Naser was originally the dubbing director of the movie.USA - (DVD) (10th Anniversary Edition).USA - 15 June 1995 (New York City, New York) (premiere).7 Added song "If I Never Knew You" 2005.According to critics, Pocahontas has influenced subsequent films. The film received two Academy Awards for Best Musical or Comedy Score for Menken and Best Original Song for "Colors of the Wind". Pocahontas earned over $346 million at the box office. The film's historical inaccuracies and racial overtones received polarized responses. Pocahontas received mixed reactions from reviewers, who praised its animation and music, but criticized its story with its lack of focus on tone. Screenwriters Carl Binder, Susannah Grant, and Philip LaZebnik took creative liberties with history in an attempt to make the film palatable to audiences. Meanwhile, Disney studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg decided the film should be a serious romantic epic in the vein of Beauty and the Beast (1991), in hope that like Beauty, it would also be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. The project went into development concurrently with The Lion King (1994), and attracted most of Disney's top animators. The score was written by Alan Menken, who also wrote the film's songs with Stephen Schwartz.Īfter making his directorial debut with The Rescuers Down Under (1990), Gabriel conceived the film during a Thanksgiving weekend.
The voice cast stars Irene Bedard and Mel Gibson as Pocahontas and Smith, respectively, with David Ogden Stiers, Russell Means, Christian Bale, Billy Connolly, and Linda Hunt providing other voices.
The film was directed by Mike Gabriel and Eric Goldberg (his feature directorial debut). It is the 33rd Disney animated feature film and the sixth film produced and released during the period known as the Disney Renaissance. The film was produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures on June 10, 1995. The film romanticises Pocahontas's encounter with John Smith and her legendary saving of his life. Pocahontas is a 1995 American animated adventure musical romantic historical drama fantasy film based on the life of the Powhatan woman Pocahontas and the arrival of English colonial settlers from the Virginia Company.