My take on…The Queens of Animation
The lightest fantasies can have the darkest realities behind them.
In
Nathalia Holt tells us the history of a group of artists in Disney animation, and the challenges they faced.
It’s important to note, that this isn’t a book about victimhood: it’s about resilience, and friendship, and triumph. It’s about artistry, which survives no matter how much it is acknowledged or suppressed.
This book has what I want a history to have:
For the Golden Age period, Holt achieves all three of those goals as well as any history I’ve ever read. That part is so well done that I wished that depth could have continued into the coverage of the more modern era. The creative forces behind the making of Pinocchio are (now) completely clear. It’s not a question of clearing up the reader’s confusion: it’s about them realizing that there are answers to questions that they hadn’t even thought to ask.
I really missed that perspective by the time we get to The Black Cauldron (1985). I would love to understand what led to the production of that PG dark fantasy and how its ultimate artistic vision was shaped by forces both within and without the studio.
My assumption is that Holt didn’t have access to the same sort of unique and rich materials she did for the 1930s and 1940s. I would happily read a ten volume Holt history of Disney, and then look forward to periodic updates.
None of that takes away from how good this book is: it belongs in every movie lover’s library, and has appeal to more general history buffs as well. It would make a great movie, although I find that an unlikely possibility.
Just a final note: I read this in a Kindle edition, which I read as part of my
subscription. It was well suited to that format, with photos included.
Feel free to let me know what you think! You can do that here or at
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This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog. To support this or other organizations, begin your Amazon shopping from a link on their sites: Amazon.com
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