Donald Virgil Bluth (/bluːθ/ BLOOTH; born September 13, 1937)[2] is an American filmmaker, animator, video game designer and author.

He is best known for directing the animated films The Secret of NIMH, An American Tail, The Land Before Time, All Dogs Go to Heaven, Anastasia and Titan A.E., for his involvement in the LaserDisc games Dragon's Lair and Space Ace, and for competing with former employer Walt Disney Productions during the years leading up to the films that became the Disney Renaissance.

[8] After leaving university, Bluth was hired in 1955 by Walt Disney Productions as an assistant to John Lounsbery for Sleeping Beauty.

[10] In 1967, Bluth returned to the animation industry, and joined Filmation working on layouts for The Archie Show and Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

During production, creative differences between Bluth and studio executives had arisen concerning artistic control and animation training practices.

[14] Nevertheless, due to the modest gross and an industry-wide animation strike, Don Bluth Productions filed for bankruptcy.

[15] His next film would have been an animated version of the Norwegian folk tale East of the Sun and West of the Moon, but the financial resources were drawn back and it was never made.

This was followed in 1984 by Space Ace, a science-fiction game based on the same technology, but which gave the player a choice of different routes to take through the story.

It initially operated from an animation facility in Van Nuys, California, but later moved to Dublin, Ireland, to take advantage of government investment and incentives.

[22][23] The main character in An American Tail (Fievel Mouskewitz) became the mascot for Amblimation while The Land Before Time was followed by thirteen direct-to-video sequels and the animated series (none of which had any involvement from Bluth or Spielberg).

The troupe's productions were presented in Bluth's home until 2012, when their administrative team leased a space off Shea Boulevard in Scottsdale and converted it into a small theater.

[27] Bluth scored a hit in 1997 with Anastasia, produced at Fox Animation Studios in Phoenix, Arizona, which grossed nearly US$140 million worldwide.

[28] In a positive review of the film, critic Roger Ebert observed that its creators "consciously include[d] the three key ingredients in the big Disney hits: action, romance, and music".

Reviews were mixed, with critics both praising and panning the controls and storyline, but the visuals were noteworthy, using groundbreaking cel-shading techniques that lent the game a hand-animated feel.

[36] Bluth and Goldman continued to work in video games and were hired to create the in-game cinematics for Namco's I-Ninja, released in 2003.

In October 2004, Polydor Records released the song "Mary", by the Scissor Sisters, which was accompanied by a music video for which Bluth did the animation.

[45] A live-action Dragon's Lair film starring Ryan Reynolds was announced to be released in 2020, but it ended up being postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

[52] Throughout Bluth's career, there were many projects that ended up unproduced or unfinished due to studio closures, his severed partnership with Steven Spielberg, or the video game crash of 1983.

During production of East of the Sun and West of the Moon, Bluth also animated a demo reel of Jawbreaker, a proposed television series by Phil Mendez of a boy who finds a magical tooth.

The second film was Satyrday, based on a story by Steven Bauer about a young boy in a fantasy world who defends the moon and sun from evil forces.

[citation needed] After his partnership with Spielberg ended, Bluth began planning another film titled The Little Blue Whale with screenwriter Robert Towne.

Following the success of Dragon's Lair in 1983, Don Bluth began plans for seven more arcade games: "The Sea Beast", "Jason and the Golden Fleece", "Devil's Island", "Haywire", "Drac", "Cro Magnon", and "Sorceress".

[62] Development on both platforms had begun in March 1999 under the film's original title Planet Ice,[63] and an early playable version was showcased at the 2000 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.

[62] In July 2000, a spokesman from the game's publisher, Fox Interactive, announced that development on the title had been halted largely due to the film's poor box office performance which was "only one of many different factors" that led to its cancellation.