8. Why Should I Worry (Oliver & Company) - Nominated by Vishje3000
I love the Goo Goo Dolls, but I absolutely worship Billy Joel. My ipod is filled with his songs, I have multiple albums floating around my computer, and I don't even bother trying to rank his songs anymore, I just listen to them and sigh at how god damn amazing Billy Joel is. This song is under the “purchased” tab in itunes for very good reason: It is absolutely amazing at any time. Billy Joel is the heart and soul of this song as its vocalist, but the music itself as well ad the theme are very powerful, if not as serious as the rest of the top ten it is surrounded by.
To understand why I love the theme of this song I feel I need to give a bit of a history of myself and my favorite Disney song of all time: Hakuna Matata. I love a great fun song that has a message but doesn't take itself seriously every once in awhile. I know this song isn't as serious as even that Hakuna Matata, and that's okay, but I love the idea of letting go of your burdens every once in awhile and having some style that Billy Joel's vocals manage to pull off so wonderfully. I don't think there is another singer alive who could have pulled off this song half as well. It isn't the lyrics telling you his mood, it is the voice itself, and that is an exceptionally rare quality.
The scene in the movie is also fantastic. Dodger is taking a tour of the city while Oliver tries his best to keep up and barely managing to follow the entire time. It has some great comedy and like the character of Dodger a ton of swagger behind it. I think it is unquestionably the highlight of the movie, followed closely by the opening number. This movie started with such amazing potential with that one two combo but it was mostly wasted by film's end, but I'll get to that in a second. Anyway as I was saying the scene really is one of the special ones in all of Disney with how much it highlights the city and how unbelievably fun it is. There is a sense of pure joy I feel whenever I watch this scene and it helps sell Dodger as such a great and lovable character despite being a dick to the poor cat.
So in summation the reason this song is so high is that Billy Joel is absolutely amazing and the scene is pretty great as well. As I said, not every song this high will involve rocket science, just a lot of them.
As for the movie itself... it is not a bad movie, but it feels as if they spent all of their good music budget on the first twelve or so minutes and then just decided they didn't care enough to continue that trend. This movie probably has the greatest one two punch to start a movie for songs in the history of Disney, and it is certainly very high up if I have omitted something from my memory when thinking about it briefly. Once Upon A Time in New York City is a very powerful and rich song, and to follow it up with Why Should I Worry was a brilliant choice. From there the rest of the songs are utterly forgettable until the reprise of WsiW.
The animation is really not up to snuff, and the plot is paper thin. Dodger holds this film together as best as he can but he is the clear highlight along with Oliver's general cuteness. I don't have really negative emotions about this movie it is just so underwhelming compared to what was to come in the coming years.
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