HOLLYWOOD, Feb. 15— Mickey Mouse has taken off his white gloves.
In an attempt to recapture its lost teen-age and young adult audience, Walt Disney Productions announced today that it will keep some of its new movies as far away from the Disney name as possible. The Disney label will be replaced by the name Touchstone Films. The Disney name will be kept, however, on its traditional movies for young children.
The Disney name and its image of Mickey Mouse, famous the world over, have been box-office poison for the last five years for the high school and college-age ticket buyers who make up the largest segment of the moviegoing public. Movie after Disney movie failed at the box office, no matter what its subject matter or quality.
Twenty years ago, Disney movies appealed to teen-agers. But the industry has long believed that young adults today, with their diet of television adventure series since early childhood, are more sophisticated in their tastes than young adults of 20 years ago and associate the Disney name with movies they feel they have outgrown.
Studio Lost $27 Million in '82
In addition, as part of a more liberal attitude toward sex and behavior generally, many children as young as 11 years old have tended to shun films with a ''G'' rating - movies appropriate for the entire family - because they are considered old fashioned. Recent Disney movies have been perceived as ''G'' films even when they carry ''PG'' ratings, and have suffered at the box office as a result.
In 1982, the studio lost more than $27 million on ''The Watcher in the Woods,'' a supernatural mystery for children; ''Night Crossing,'' the story of a balloon escape from East Germany, and ''TRON,'' an adventure story taking place inside a computer that the studio felt could be as successful as ''Star Wars.'' Last year was even worse. The film division lost more than $33 million, most of it on a high- budget version of a Ray Bradbury novel, ''Something Wicked This Way Comes.''
For its one movie that is now doing well at the box office, ''Never Cry Wolf,'' which has a ''PG'' rating, the studio did its best to hide the Disney connection. According to Barry Lorie, the vice president of marketing, no wolves were shown in the advertising of the movie about a zoologist studying wolves in the Arctic ''because it would have come off as a Disney wildlife adventure.''
Disney expects that perhaps as many as half of its six to eight movies a year will be sent out under the Touchstone label. ''Splash,'' a ''PG''- rated comedy about a man who falls in love with a mermaid, will be the first Touchstone film. Studio publicity describes ''Splash,'' which stars Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah, as ''a sensuous love story.'' When ''Splash'' is released in 650 theaters across the country on March 9, nothing on the screen or in the publicity will identify it as a Disney movie.
'More Adult, More Mature'
Next October, ''Country,'' a grim story about present-day farmers starring Sam Shepard and Jessica Lange, will carry the Touchstone label.
Richard Berger, who was brought in as president of Disney's film division 10 months ago, spoke of Touchstone films as ''more adult, more mature.''
He did not discount the possibility that some Touchstone films may be rated ''R'' - no one under 17 admitted without a parent or adult guardian. ''It would depend on how much sex, how much language, how much violence,'' Mr. Berger said.
Referring to ''Brubaker,'' a film with which he was involved as a vice president of production at 20th Century-Fox, Mr. Berger said, ''I wouldn't start developing a tough prison movie. But if Robert Redford wanted to do that 'R' film, I would.''
Mr. Berger put Disney's image problem into a nutshell when he said, ''Audiences don't know who made 'Star Wars' or 'Raiders of the Lost Ark.' They do know who made 'TRON' and 'The Apple Dumpling Gang.' If you put Disney's name on top of 'Emmanuelle,' and had 'X'- rated at the bottom, people would say, 'We can bring our children.' ''
A few minutes earlier he had said that no matter what the movie, teen- agers would spurn a Disney film with, ''That's for my younger brother.''
At a news conference held on the Disney lot today, Mr. Berger was wearing a Mickey Mouse watch. It would not be possible - psychologically or financially - for Disney to turn its back completely on the Mouse. Ron Miller, the president and chief executive officer of Walt Disney Productions and Walt Disney's son- in-law, called himself ''the caretaker of the library'' - that vast collection of cartoons, television programs, movies and especially feature-length animated films made by Disney during the last 61 years.
The animated features are Disney's annuity. They are released every seven years to a new generation of children as eager to see them as their older brothers, parents and grandparents were. ''Snow White,'' re-released last summer, sold some $30 million worth of tickets in 1983 and earned Disney nearly $15 million. ''Snow White,'' which has been released seven times, is now the 50th most successful picture of all time in American theaters. And the classic Disney films do even better abroad. A 1979 reissue of ''The Jungle Book'' in West Germany was the highest-grossing film ever released there, earning more money than ''Star Wars.''
Partly because of the trouble in its film division and partly because of the financial drain of starting its pay- cable Disney Channel, Disney stock has fallen from $82 to $52 per share over the last year.
Disney chose Touchstone - which means a test of quality - out of 1,200 names submitted by a product design firm. The runner-up name was Silver Wind.
