Lots of oohs and ah's when Pamela Franklin gets to feed a baby tiger a bottle of milk, but that just indicates how silly the script was and how unoriginal it was. The mid 1960's had a lot of movies with wild animals going haywire with "Zebra in the Kitchen", "Fluffy", "Clarence the Cross-Eyed Lion" and "Sammy, the Way Out Seal", all influenced by "Hatari", and the tide not changing for more serious animal stories until "Born Free".
Due to abuse, a bengal tiger escapes from a traveling circus and the local town goes ballistic in trying to decide what to do. The town elders (all pompous white men, led by the always pompous Edward Andrews) want to shoot it down, while the kids want to save it. At the forefront of the story are Brian Keith and Vera Miles (Franklin's parents), with Keith finding pressure from both sides.
The casting director went out of their way in hiring veteran actors for the film to populate the town and flesh out the staff of the circus. Harold Peary ("The Great Gildersleeve") is outlandishly silly as a TV host, but Sabu (in his last role) very dignified as the trainer whom everyone should have been listening in the first place. Una Merkel (reunited with Keith after "The Parent Trap"), Connie Gilchrist, Frank McHugh and Arthur Hunnicutt are amusing in smaller parts. I found this a mixed bag, a combination of sensible environmentalist concern and sappy sentiment, overloaded with juvenile style farce. The first shot of the tiger with obvious blue screen is totally laughable.
Due to abuse, a bengal tiger escapes from a traveling circus and the local town goes ballistic in trying to decide what to do. The town elders (all pompous white men, led by the always pompous Edward Andrews) want to shoot it down, while the kids want to save it. At the forefront of the story are Brian Keith and Vera Miles (Franklin's parents), with Keith finding pressure from both sides.
The casting director went out of their way in hiring veteran actors for the film to populate the town and flesh out the staff of the circus. Harold Peary ("The Great Gildersleeve") is outlandishly silly as a TV host, but Sabu (in his last role) very dignified as the trainer whom everyone should have been listening in the first place. Una Merkel (reunited with Keith after "The Parent Trap"), Connie Gilchrist, Frank McHugh and Arthur Hunnicutt are amusing in smaller parts. I found this a mixed bag, a combination of sensible environmentalist concern and sappy sentiment, overloaded with juvenile style farce. The first shot of the tiger with obvious blue screen is totally laughable.