Mickey Mouse

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful illustrations; so-so text
Review: An utterly gorgeous book that succeeds on the strength of its dozens and dozens of pieces of beautifully-reproduced artwork, mostly from Mickey's golden age (1928-1940). But Lambert's text, stiffly translated from the French, has little that's new in terms of historical fact or artistic insight, and it's peppered with small errors that should have been caught. Is this book worth a hundred and fifty bucks (or even Amazon's $105)? I'm not sure; I cashed in $85 worth of Amazon gift certificates to get it. But Mickey aficionados will probably get a big kick out of it based on the art alone, despite the high price and disappointing text.

Rating:
Summary: Art is beautifully presented
Review: I do not disagree with the other reviews regarding the depth or accuracy of the text. However, the reproduction of the art is amazing. The pictures of the cels have a shiny lacquer finish that gives a good feel for cels and the subtle textures of the background come through. It is an excellent visual history of the Mickey Mouse cartoons and makes a great companion piece to the new DVD collection of Mickey Mouse cartoons in color.

Rating:
Summary: Tour a great art gallery with an inexperienced guide
Review: Pierre Lambert's phenomenal mix of beautiful Mickey Mouse graphics stand unmatched by any other book; illustrations even include scenes from cartoons that have been banned. For these rare pictures alone, the book deserves some credit.
Unfortunately, serious errors in the text compromise everything. It's just the standard company line -- denigrate the rowdy scamp Mickey initially was, then praise the blandly perfect role model he's often shown as today. In the process, we've overlooked the perfect meeting point between those two extremes; Mickey as still-rascally but wholly-likeable adventurer, which is his real personality as a mature cartoon figure. Anyone can pay tribute to Mickey as a symbol; the ideal Mickey book would understand him as a personality. Pity that Lambert hasn't, for all his obvious effort.
How do I know he hasn't understood the mouse? Because while he's looked at the art from a terrific number of films, he seems not to have seen many of the films themselves. Artwork said to be from one film is often from another (in one case, crude art from 1930 is said to have been done several years later, when the Disney studio had moved past the more primitive style).
Icing on the cake is the fact that the book's English-language translator retranslated quotes from Walt Disney himself, and from others, from Lambert's French without checking to see how they originally read in English. You may recall how some quotes from Walt himself read in other, better books.
Maybe it's the Disney corporation's fault; maybe Lambert was unable to see many Mickey cartoons on video or TV because Disney has made very few of them available in recent years (after all, the thinking goes, why merchandise the mouse when Winnie the Pooh will always be slightly more successful?). If this is the case, what a shame. Mickey deserves better than this lavish, but ultimately wanting tribute.


Rating:
Summary: Spectacular Art, But Poorly Constructed
Review: Undoubtedly the most indepth study of the art of Mickey Mouse. Each page is spectacular and beautifully presented with animation art including cels, drawings, and concept sketches. Almost any page would look wonderful framed. But a major flaw! The binding has separated in every display copy we have seen; every display copy in every store we found it in was badly damaged. We found the same thing to happen with the Art of Hercules. Hyperion seems to be lacking in the quality binding department. We understand that the French version of the Mickey Mouse book (published by Demons & Merveilles) is better constructed. Still, author Pierre Lambert is a hero for tackling such a huge project in an impressive way.