The Old Prisoner is a minor character in Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He is an elderly man who serves as a returning gag in the film, where he is accidentally freed from a prison, cheers in joy, and ends up trapping himself in yet another prison.
Role in the film
When Esmeralda and her goat Djali try to escape from Frollo's soldiers, she knocks a large cage which contains an old prisoner in it to the ground, and it rolls away with Esmeralda and Djali riding on top of it and then jumping off it, causing it to land on top of the soldiers and knock them out, destroying the age in the process.
When the Old Prisoner realizes he's free, he happily screams "I'm free, I'm free!" But as he climbs out, he hits his foot on the cage, causing him to trip and fall into a stockade, which closes and locks, thus imprisoning him again, to which he says "Dang it!".
A few days later, as the citizens of Paris and the French army are fighting Frollo's soldiers, one of the soldiers accidentally breaks the lock off the stockade with a beam, to which the Old Prisoner becomes free again. Once again, he happily celebrates his freedom by screaming "I'm free, I'm free!". He's so busy celebrating his freedom, that he doesn't pay attention to where he's going, and he falls into a hole with a sign next to it that says "Mon Sewer". After this, he once again says "Dang it!" He isn't seen throughout the rest of the film after this, and is presumed to be rescued by the French army.
Gallery
Trivia
- The Old Prisoner's design bares a striking resemblance to Jafar's beggar disguise in the film Aladdin, released four years earlier.
