Tom Sawyer is a 2000 American animated musical adventure film directed by Paul Sabella and Phil Mendez.

It is an adaptation of Mark Twain's 1876 novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, with a cast of anthropomorphic animals instead of humans.

That night, when Tom and Huck go treasure hunting, they find Injurin' Joe and his sidekick Mutt Potter uncovering a chest of gold.

As the boys watch from behind a tombstone, Joe brutally murders Bean who tried to hit him with a shovel, frames Mutt and captures Rebel.

Amy is so happy because she wants to tell on Becky, but Tom takes the blame, for which he receives a brutal spanking with a ruler by Mr. Dobbins.

When Tom and Huck swims back to town, they learn that the townspeople are mourning their deaths, believing the boys to have drowned.

Judge Thatcher sentences Mutt to be hanged, but Huck and Tom testify against Joe at the last minute.

[7] MGM released Tom Sawyer on DVD and VHS on April 4,[8] its soundtrack issued by MCA Records the same day.

Harlene Ellin of The Chicago Tribune gave a negative review, saying that it "stray[ed] too far from Twain.

"[12] An uncredited review in the Wichita Eagle was also unfavorable, calling it a "shallow" interpretation of Twain's work.

However, he found the portrayals of Tom and Becky a "little bland" and the song "Friends for Life" "incongruous, as though it had been tacked on for length.

"[14] AllMovie also highlighted the animation,[15] while The Star-Ledger spotlight its "pronounced country flavor" songs as well as "attractive extras.

"[16] Variety, in addition to the "energetic numbers," highlighted the film's dark content for a children's product, such as the murder sequence and the stakes of a dog character possibly being executed; but dismissed the visual gags and its more sentimental musical numbers as uninventive.

While applauding the "school antics" and orchestral score, he called the animation "weak" even for direct-to-video standards, suggested even children would be turned off by the sugarcoating of the material, mocked Atkins' performance as a "witlessly cheerful Gomer Pyle style," and panned the songs' "banal" qualities and "hard-core twang.