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Summary: Beautiful Illustrations for Christmas
Review: "If You Take A Mouse To The Movies" by Laura Numeroff, with Illustrations by Felicia Bond, A Laura Geringer Book, 2000.This is an excellent continuation of the collaboration of Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond on children's books based upon fanciful "IF/THEN" statements. If you take a Mouse to the movies, then he will want popcorn; THEN, this results in his stringing the popcorn to decorate the Christmas Tree (which is the central theme of this beautiful book), and then, and so on. Each improbable "THEN" is the joy of this book. For example, the little Mouse is given just the right clothes for the wintry weather, including a cute red woolen cap, with holes for his large ears. Finally, after making snowmen, decorating a Christmas Tree, you will come full circle, and, after giving the Mouse another batch of popcorn, again, "...he'll want you to take him to the moves". I enjoyed reading this book to my grandchildren. The younger boys (twins) were captivated by the richness of details in Felicia Bond's illustrations, while the older grandchildren (especially the girl) rolled their eyes and smiled at the "silliness" of each new IF/THEN situation ...for example, a Mouse making a "snowman" and (!) with snowy white mouse ears! The Christmas theme makes this an ideal gift for the impending holidays.
Rating: 
Summary: We liked her other books better
Review: "If you take a mouse to the movies" isn't the best book by Laura Joffe Numeroff. We liked her other books better. The other ones are more fun. This one is kind of silly. The moose book is the funniest.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Book for Christmas Holidays
Review: 'If You Take A Mouse To The Movies' by Laura Numeroff, with Illustrations by Felicia Bond, A Laura Geringer Book, 2000. This is an excellent continuation of the collaboration of Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond on children's books based upon fanciful 'IF/THEN' statements. If you take a Mouse to the movies, then he will want popcorn; THEN, this results in his stringing the popcorn to decorate the Christmas Tree (which is the central theme of this beautiful book), and then, and so on. Each improbable 'THEN' is the joy of this book. For example, the little Mouse is given just the right clothes for the wintry weather, including a cute red woolen cap, with holes for his large ears. Finally, after making snowmen, decorating a Christmas Tree, you will come full circle, and, after giving the Mouse another batch of popcorn, again, ''he'll want you to take him to the moves'. I enjoyed reading this book to my grandchildren. The younger boys (twins) were captivated by the richness of details in Felicia. Bond's illustrations, while the older grandchildren (especially the girl) rolled their eyes at the 'silliness' of each new IF/THEN situation 'for example, a Mouse making a 'snowman' and (!) with snowy white mouse ears! The Christmas theme makes this an ideal gift for the impending holidays.
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Summary: A Worthy Christmas Variation of If You Give a Moose a Muffin
Review: Children benefit from stories with predictability. They also need stories that expand their imaginations. If You Take a Mouse to the Movies provides plenty of both. If you have read the other wonderful stories that precede this one by Felicia Bond, you will quickly recognize the theme. One thing leads to another . . . and pretty soon you are back at the beginning. In this case, the sequence is from movies to popcorn, to strings of popcorn as an ornament, to a Christmas tree, to snowman, to carrot, to fort, to snowball fight, to being cold, to blanket, to Christmas carols, to radio, to singing along, to making Christmas tree ornaments, to popcorn strung as an ornament, . . . and on to a movie. The beauty of these stories is that they take the perspective of a parent, older sibling, or other older person. This is a hard perspective for a child to appreciate . . . except in these stories. Intuitively, your child will recognize her or his many demands and how they build up on the provider. The result may be to help create a child's perception with a better sense of self-imposed limits. The long-suffering expression on the boy's face as he helps the mouse surely will create sympathy. I also like the way this book helps children see the connections among things, ideas, and actions. Learning to identify natural systems is a good thinking skill to develop. The repetition is desirable from another perspective. There are fewer words to learn as a beginning reader. The humor makes it fun to reread the book, which can lead to memorizing it faster, which leads to learning to read it sooner. The illustrations are particularly fine in their color and clarify. They set a wonderful mood of positive adventure for your child. After you have finished enjoying the story for about the 100th time, I suggest that you and your child or grandchild try your hand at writing and illustrating a similar kind of story. The challenges of extending a string of actions and items to reconnect with the beginning will enhance the perceptual benefits that can be gained from this fine book. What goes around, comes around.
Rating:
Summary: Delightfully predictable
Review: Consistent with her other works on the same vein, Numeroff pulls a Christmas theme. My children enjoyed it thoroughly and found great humor in the Numeroff world where everything impacts on everything else: A truism that should not be forgotten and that we should all remember as we grow and learn to take responsibility for our actions. The book is sweet. The tone soothing.
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Summary: A Wonderful Book for the Season
Review: Every year it is a tradition with my young nieces to comes over to my home, have hot chocolate, write their own Christmas cards and read books that I've found. After seeing this book on t.v., I purchased it and thought it would be great for the girls - in fact I purchased several books but their favorite was "If You Take A Mouse To The Movies". We read it over and over again and they loved the illustrations. I would not hesitate to recommend it or purchase any of Felicia Bond's books.
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Summary: If you buy a child this book, expect to read it often!
Review: I first read my little sister "If You Give a Pig a Pancake" which we absolutely love. Although this book is not quite as memorable or charming, it is still a must for any bookcase. One of the not-to-be-underestimated benefits of this series of books is their brevity. This book is divine as a bed-time story. The only reason I did not give this book a five star rating is because I liked the originals (If you give a mouse a cookie, and the aforementioned If you give a pig a pancake) so much more, and I would recommend purchasing those books first.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing entry in the popular series
Review: I have the 'Mouse...Cookie', 'Moose...Muffin', and 'Pig...Pancake' books, and those are some of the most creative, amusing children's books I've ever read. My kids like them immensely too. Imagine my disappointment, then, after we read this installment in the series. I have two main problems with this book. First, the chain of events don't seem to flow as naturally as the other books. For example, the mouse will go from putting a carrot on a snowman's nose to building a snow fort. There is no correlating reason why the mouse jumps from one activity to another in this book, unlike the original books. Events occur randomly rather than flowing like a domino chain, which severely hampers the flow. Second, I personally found this book to be very predictable. The ending is EXACTLY like the beginning except in reverse. In contrast, for example, the moose wanted jam with the muffin in the beginning, which is obtained from the fridge. In the end, though, it's not the fridge that triggers the desire for jam...it's something else. So it's not merely the beginning in reverse. In this book, though, it is indeed the fridge (to borrow the analogy) that triggers the desire for the jam...and that's what makes the story predictable. To summarize, this looks like a story where someone tried unsuccessfully to mimic Numeroff's style. Too bad Numeroff couldn't mimic herself better.
Rating: 
Summary: This is Just Too Ridiculous
Review: I may be the lone dissenter here, but I really didn't care for this book. It plain made no sense! Yeah, it is easy to argue the point that there are many books that don't make sense, but this one really is ludicrous. The strange repasts, such as moose muffins were silly and the pig pancakes were just over the top. I didn't like this book and I have a feeling I would not have enjoyed it as a child, either. This style of story just doesn't appeal to me.
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Summary: Not About the Movies.
Review: I picked this book up because I thought it was going to be a story about watching movies with a mouse. However, it's not. Instead it's about what happens when a young boy takes a mouse to the movies and how he gets sidetracked on the way home into doing all sorts of things assorted with Christmas: from getting a Christmas tree, to building a snowman, to building a snowfort. The illustrations are quite nice and children love hearing this story read over and over. Even though, I used to teach at a preschool, I didn't know this book was written by the same lady who wrote IF YOU GIVE A MOOSE A MUFFIN. That book is much more interesting and the zany connections made are more humorous for all ages. Nevertheless, IF YOU TAKE A MOUSE TO THE MOVIES is a decent book and makes for some fun holiday reading with youngsters--read the book, then do some of the activities described together.
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