The Gnome-Mobile

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Gnome-Mobile is a 1967 Disney musical film, directed by Robert Stevenson.

It was based on a 1936 book by Upton Sinclair entitled The Gnome-Mobile. The children, Elizabeth and Rodney, were played by Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber, familiar from their roles as the Banks children in Mary Poppins. The title song, a.k.a. '"The Gnome-Mobile Song", was written by the Sherman Brothers, who were also the songwriters of Mary Poppins.

[edit] Plot summary

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The story opens with the children's grandfather, D.J. Mulrooney (Walter Brennan), a well-known executive officer of a vast timber-trading company. D.J., an eccentric and passionate man with a distinctive snore, as well as vast dedication and determination, abandons all else in order to show his descendants the Redwood trees, which unfortunately are being cut down indiscriminately by the company's loggers. In the forest, Elizabeth encounters a gnome called Jasper (Tom Lowell), who is desperately seeking a bride for himself. Elizabeth, touched by the trusting gnome, agrees to help him find one. She is seconded by Rodney and D.J. who. while at first skeptical of Jasper's existence. soon are brought to know. They are introduced to Jasper's 900-year old grandfather Knobby (also played by Brennan) who, like D.J., is passionate and somewhat bombastic. Gnomes and Big People alike join up and set off gnome-hunting straight away.

Trouble begins, however, when Knobby discovers that D.J. is indirectly responsible for the tree-cutting. The two elders quarrel, and the party breaks up. Jasper is kidnapped by Horatio Quaxton (Sean McClory), a freak show owner, while D.J. is committed to an asylum by his own Company Head of Security, Ralph Yarby (Richard Deacon), who has heard about the gnomes and deems his master insane. Rodney and Elizabeth rescue D.J., rescue the gnomes (humiliating Quaxton in the process) and make their way onward. Their destination is a vast acreage of virgin forest, where they hope to find more gnomes.

Yarby, on finding that D.J. has escaped, mounts pursuit, but not being as good a driver is soon thwarted by his former master's unorthodox choice of routes. His car literally falls apart, followed bit after bit by his composure.

The gnomes and their Big Friends arrive at the right place, where they are successful. Jasper is presented by a Gnomish elder as "the eligible gnome" to several females of his race, who then compete in a contest to discover which one will marry him. The bachelor is covered in soap, then set upon by the girls, who try to hold onto him for seven seconds. The one who does, Violet (Cami Sebring), is Jasper's choice from the beginning, but is put out of the running several times before realizing her newborn attachment to him.

D.J., for his part, gives as a wedding-present the exploitation rights to several acres of forest, which become a haven for the gnomes.