Best Books on Animated Feature Film History?

[Neal]

I am looking for books that specifically offer history and critique of feature-length (can be 30+ minute) animated films. There are a lot of books out there about animated shorts and television shows, but the books on feature films see more elusive. Here are the ones I have read:

"Full Length Animated Feature Films" (Bruno Edera)
"The Animated Movie Guide" (Jerry Beck)
"100 Animated Feature Films" (Andrew Osmond)
'Of Mice and Magic' (Leonard Maltin)

I wondered if anyone here had read some of these following books and could offer an opinion, seeing as reviews are nonexistent on e-bookstores:

"The Animated Film Encyclopedia: A Complete Guide to American Shorts, Features and Sequences 1900-1999"

"French Animation History"

... and what other books should I look into on this area? Thanks!

[Ben]

Charles Solomon's excellent history of animation (I forget the exact title now) is proably essential reading for you, although I believe it's likely to be OOP now.

You've pretty much got it covered with those other books if all you want is an overview of features specifically, but there is a hard to find book by John Halas that gives a list and comment on every feature up to its mid-70s publication date that includes stuff I'd never known about.

[Neal]

"Enchanted Drawings" and it looks to be quite comprehensive. I will check it out for sure.

As for the Halas book, I wonder if you're just thinking of Bruno Edera's book, which when published in '77 contained info. on most animated films to that point and was edited by Halas.

[Ben]

Yep, on both counts.

[Neal]

Well pity there are not more, I was hopeful there might be some unknown gem but online retailers had it covered.

[Whippet Angel]

Mouse Under Glass by David Koenig is also a good one.

[Buzz Bumble]

Only two years late, but I've got three books which are very good (although they're probably difficult to find these days):

• The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation by Frank Thomas & Ollie Johnston. Published by Hyperion.

• The Encyclopeida of Walt Disney's Animated Characters by John Grant. Published by Hyperion.

• The Art of Hanna-Barbera by Ted Sennett. Published by Viking Studio Books

[DrumFeat]

Out of all The Encyclopeida of Walt Disney's Animated Characters is one of my favorites and it seems to be the best.

[poojasl1]

hi,

i think Enchanted Drawings is best.

[Bill Henderson]

I am looking for a publisher for my newly-completed book THE NINE DISNEY ANIMATED MASTERPIECES. I would be happy to share it with you (and others!) if you like. I can provide a pdf of the whole thing. Feedback would be much appreciated. Here is a synopsis:

THE NINE DISNEY ANIMATED FEATURES clearly expresses the author’s immense admiration for Walt Disney’s unique achievements: not just the films themselves but the establishment and definition of an entirely new artform, the art of animation. The book’s Prologue and first three chapters are devoted to “preliminaries”. These include not only the definition of “masterpiece” and how these films qualify as such but also how they continue to influence contemporary filmmakers. Early influences that shaped Walt Disney’s “reality revision” are explored as well as his career-long development of technologies to immerse audiences more thoroughly into the fantastic realms he conjured through animation. Expanding upon the information in these preliminaries, subsequent chapters examine individually each of the nine animated features under consideration: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Bambi, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp and Sleeping Beauty.
Other “Disney books” are devoted either to a single film or cursorily to many, but this one delves into “microscopic” detail about each and offers absorbing in-depth information about the original story sources, their elaborate development by the Disney studio artists, their overall design, the collaborative contributions of many great artists – animators, composers, graphic artists, actors, et al., the cultural and historic milieu surrounding their production, the technical advancements of each, their themes, shot-by-shot details of the animation, their critical and popular reception and an evaluation of each as an individual artwork. The Epilogue sums up these assessments and explains how and why connoisseurs of high culture have neglected Walt Disney’s sublime artistry and continue to do so to this very day.

[Bill Henderson]

For an example from my book THE NINE DISNEY ANIMATED MASTERPIECES here's a pdf of only my Bambi Chapter:

Sorry: every time I try to attach the pdf file I get an error notice. Am I doing something wrong?

[gaastra]

Can't go wrong with jerry becks animation books.

For 80s--

Prime target for transformers

https://www.amazon.com/Prime-Targets-Un ... 361&sr=8-1

He-man history book for he-man--

https://www.amazon.com/He-Man-She-Ra-Co ... NrPXRydWU=

[Ben]

Hi Bill,

Can I ask why just nine, and how and why you chose those nine? Apart from a chronological run through the major Disney films through a twenty-ish year period between 1937 and 1959 pre-Xerox methods, the obvious omission to me would be Dumbo, making up a "perfect ten"…?