The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)

Most people think so. 81% of audiences gave it a thumbs up, by Google's archived audience score. Critics agree, scoring it 77%.

Isolated bell-ringer Quasimodo wishes to leave Notre Dame tower against the wishes of Judge Claude Frollo, his stern guardian and Paris' strait-laced Minister of Justice. His first venture to the outside world finds him Esmeralda, a kind-hearted and fearless Romani woman who openly stands up to Frollo's tyranny. Wikipedia ↗

The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a 1996 American animated musical drama produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation, the studio's darkest and most thematically ambitious film of the Renaissance era. Based on Victor Hugo's 1831 novel, the film follows Quasimodo, voiced by Tom Hulce, a deformed bell-ringer who has been raised in the bell tower of Notre Dame Cathedral by his cruel guardian Judge Claude Frollo, voiced by Tony Jay, who has convinced Quasimodo that he is too monstrous to be seen by the outside world. When Quasimodo ventures out during the Festival of Fools and meets the compassionate Romani woman Esmeralda, voiced by Demi Moore, he defies Frollo — who is revealed to have murdered Quasimodo's mother and who now lusts after Esmeralda with a religious fervor that alternates between desire and genocidal hatred.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame tackled themes of religious hypocrisy, genocide, lust, and social injustice with remarkable boldness for a children's film. Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz's score, particularly Frollo's "Hellfire" — in which the villain prays before a fireplace while hallucinating Esmeralda and confessing his sinful desire — was the darkest and most musically sophisticated number Disney had ever produced. The film earned $325 million worldwide.