The Little Mermaid is a 1989 American animated film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale of the same name. Distributed by Walt Disney Pictures, the film was originally released to theaters on November 14, 1989 and is the twenty-eighth film in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, and the first of the Disney Renaissance. During its initial release, The Little Mermaid earned $84 million in North American box office revenue, and has to date earned $211 million in total lifetime gross. After the success of the 1988 Disney/Amblin film Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Little Mermaid is given credit for breathing life back into the art of animated feature films after a string of critical or commercial failures that dated back to the early 1980s. It also marked the start of the era known as the Disney Renaissance. A stage adaptation of the film with a book by Doug Wright and additional songs by Alan Menken and new lyricist Glenn Slater...