Before they started making "Banjo", artist and story writer Ken Anderson had been getting into "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH", which he called "a wonderful story". He gave the book to Bluth for him to read and make a film out of after Bluth finished the animation direction of "Pete's Dragon". Bluth later showed "NIMH" to Disney animation director Wolfgang Reitherman, who turned down Bluth's offers to make a movie based on the book, stating, "We've already got a mouse Mickey Mouse and we've done a mouse movie "The Rescuers"." However, Bluth also presented the novel to the other staff that would work for Don Bluth Productions later on and they all loved it. Two months later, former Disney executive James L. Stewart, who now had started Aurora Productions, called Goldman and told him about Anderson's idea of making a film based on "NIMH". At Bluth, Goldman and Pomeroy's request, Aurora Productions acquired the film rights and offered Don Bluth Productions a budget of US$ 5.7 million and 30 months to complete the film, tighter in both budget and schedule than most Disney animated features at the time.