The Old Mill

The Old Mill is a 1937 Silly Symphonies cartoon produced by Walt Disney, directed by Wilfred Jackson, scored by Leigh Harline, and released to theaters by RKO Radio Pictures on November 5, 1937. The film depicts the natural community of animals populating an old abandoned windmill in the country, and how they deal with a violent thunderstorm that nearly destroys their habitat.

Like many of the later Silly Symphonies, The Old Mill was a testing-ground for advanced animation techniques. Marking the first use of Disney's multiplane camera, the film also incorporates realistic depictions of animal behavior, complex lighting and color effects, depictions of rain, wind, lightning, ripples, splashes and reflections, three-dimensional rotation of detailed objects, and the use of timing to produce specific dramatic and emotional effects. All of the lessons learned from making The Old Mill would subsequently be incorporated into Disney's feature-length animated films, especially 1937's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

The Old Mill won the 1937 Academy Award for Best Short Subjects: Cartoons. In 1994 it was voted #14 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field. It is ranked at the IMDb top short list as the 17th greatest short film ever.

This cartoon was parodied in The Simpsons episode Bart Has Two Mommies, where Homer tries to win a rubber duck race by making his rubber duck cross the finish line first. The duck however floats to an abandoned windmill very similar to the one in the classic Disney short, with a sign declaring: "The Old Mill." The scene where the duck is nearly squashed by the water wheel is a direct reference to the most famous scene of "The Old Mill." Raymond Scott's Powerhouse B is heard in the Old Mill scene where Homer protected the duck from the water wheel in that scene.

The Old Mill was featured in the World of Color presentation at Disney's California Adventure.