Arthur J. Vitarelli Filmography

Occupation:: First Assistant Director, Director, Second Unit Director

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Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Dean Jones, Don Knotts, Julie Sommars, Jacques Marin, Roy Kinnear

Synopsis: It's love at first spark plug for Herbie, the spunky Disney Volkswagen, in Herbie Goes To Monte Carlo. Herbie reunites with Jim Douglas (Dean Jones), his driver from the original The Love Bug, as they participate in the annual Monte Carlo road rally. Herbie holds his own in the qualifying races Read More

1977
Gus

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Ed Asner, Don Knotts, Gary Grimes, Tim Conway, Liberty Williams

Synopsis: In this Disney film, Hank Cooper (Ed Asner) the owner of a losing professional football team, recruits Gus, a Yugoslavian soccer player, to his team. Even though Gus is a mule, he figures the animal can be taught to make field-goal kicks. Despite the outrage of his team, and sabotage efforts by Read More

1976
The Shaggy D.A.

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Dean Jones, Tim Conway, Suzanne Pleshette, Keenan Wynn, Jo Ann Worley

Synopsis: Robert Stevenson, Walt Disney Productions' house director, cobbled together his 19th family film for the organization with this slapstick sequel to the Disney comedy The Shaggy Dog (produced 17 years after the fact). Dean Jones plays Wilby Daniels, a lawyer running against the villainous John Read More

1976
Herbie Rides Again

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Helen Hayes, Ken Berry, Stefanie Powers, John McIntire, Keenan Wynn

Synopsis: Herbie Rides Again is the first sequel to Disney's fabulously successful The Love Bug. The emphasis here is on Mrs. Steinmetz (Helen Hayes), a feisty old San Franciscan who refuses to sell her home to conniving developer Alonzo Hawk (Keenan Wynn). Hawk's nephew, lawyer Willoughby Whitfield (Ken Berry Read More

1974
The World's Greatest Athlete

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Tim Conway, Jan-Michael Vincent, John Amos, Roscoe Lee Browne, Dayle Haddon

Synopsis: One of the best of the early-1970s Disney farces, The World's Greatest Athlete stars Jan-Michael Vincent in the title role. A "wild boy" living off the land in the jungles of Africa, Vincent is discovered by coaches Tim Conway and John Amos. Cursed with a last-place college athletic lineup, Conway Read More

1973
Now You See Him, Now You Don't

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Joyce Menges, Kurt Russell, Cesar Romero, Joe Flynn, Jim Backus, William Windom

Synopsis: If anyone is interested in seeing what Kurt Russell used to do before transforming into Snake Plissken in Escape From New York, they can look no further than this labored Disney slapstick marzipan sequel to The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes. Kurt Russell, once again, is Dexter Riley, a science major Read More

1972
Bedknobs and Broomsticks

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Ian Weighall, Angela Lansbury, David Tomlinson, Roddy McDowall, Sam Jaffe, John Ericson

Synopsis: Bedknobs and Broomsticks was produced several years after Walt Disney's death and released in the fall of 1971. As it turned out, Bedknobs was frequently compared to Mary Poppins -- probably thanks to several striking similarities between the two productions, notably the presence in the cast of David Tomlinson Read More

1971
The Boatniks

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Robert Morse, Stefanie Powers, Phil Silvers, Norman Fell, Mickey Shaughnessy

Synopsis: The inept Ensign Garland (Robert Morse) battles a trio of jewel thieves in this Walt Disney comedy. Garland starts by spilling paint on the lovely Kate Fairchild (Stephanie Powers). Harry (Phil Silvers), Max (Norman Fell) and Charlie (Mickey Shaughnessy) try to recover the jewels accidentally Read More

1970
Blackbeard's Ghost

Crew: Second Unit Director

Actors: Peter Ustinov, Dean Jones, Suzanne Pleshette, Elsa Lanchester, Joby Baker

Synopsis: Blackbeard's Ghost was one of the first Disney productions released after Walt's death. Peter Ustinov stars as the eponymous wraith, who returns to Earth to come to aid of his descendant, elderly Elsa Lanchester. The villains want to kick Lanchester and her friends out of their group home so that Read More

1968
The Gnome-Mobile

Crew: Director

Actors: Walter Brennan, Tom Lowell, Matthew Garber, Karen Dotrice, Ed Wynn, Richard Deacon

Synopsis: The Gnome-Mobile was Walt Disney's first all-out fantasy since Mary Poppins. Walter Brennan stars in a dual role, as kindly lumber tycoon D. J. Mulrooney and the irascible (and much tinier) 943-year-old gnome Knobby. Mulrooney likes Knobby and his fellow gnomes, but the feeling isn't reciprocal Read More

1967
Big Red

Crew: First Assistant Director

Actors: Walter Pidgeon, Gilles Payant, Emile Genest

Synopsis: Big Red is one of several Disney pictures filmed in Canada during the 1960s. Orphaned Gilles Payant goes to work for wealthy Walter Pidgeon, who raises prize dogs. Pidgeon's particular favorite among his canines is Big Red, who unfortunately resists all efforts to be trained. Young Payant manages Read More

1962
The Shaggy Dog

Crew: First Assistant Director

Actors: Fred MacMurray, Jean Hagen, Tommy Kirk, Annette Funicello, Tim Considine

Synopsis: This is a routine Disney comedy-fantasy about a boy who turns into a large sheep dog at the most inopportune moments. That is assuming there would be opportune moments. Young Wilby Daniels (Tommy Kirk) finds a magic ring that used to belong to the Borgia family. When he pronounces an inscription Read More

1959
The Maverick Queen

Crew: First Assistant Director

Actors: Barbara Stanwyck, Barry Sullivan, Scott Brady, Mary Murphy, Wallace Ford, Howard Petrie

Synopsis: Based on a Zane Grey novel published over a decade after the author's death, The Maverick Queen stars Barbara Stanwyck in the title role. As head of the outlaw gang called The Wild Bunch, Kit Banion (Stanwyck) wreaks havoc on the banks and railroads of the West. Pinkerton detective Jeff (Barry Read More

1955