The Hand Behind the Mouse -- Ub Iwerks bio

[Jon Cooke]

I bought a copy of the Ub Iwerks biography, The Hand Behind the Mouse, at Walt Disney World last month... and have been reading it a little at a time (I am about halfway through). While it does have some interesting stories about Iwerks and Disney, I haven't been that impressed so far. Unlike Keith Scott's Jay Ward book from last year, The Moose That Roared, which I couldn't put down.

My biggest complaint about the Iwerks bio is the constant complaints of some of the cartoons' content. Politically incorrect gags from Oswald cartoons are brought up. Then the Chinese stereotypes of Flip the Frog's "Chinaman's Chance" are criticized (the authors even go as far as to suggest no other animation studio would have made a cartoon with such stereotypes). Then any other stereotype imaginable (Indians, black, homosexual, arab) are criticized in the ComiColor Classics section. I swear they talk more about how "offensive" the stuff is than about the cartoons themselves.

I wish there was more coverage of Flip the Frog. Heck, there wasn't even a *mention* of "Funny Face" or "Techno-Cracked" which are considered to be the best in the series! And there are hardly any pictures. The only cartoon picture is some of the storyboard from Mickey's "The Karnival Kid".

Maybe I should wait until I read the other half of the book... maybe it gets better...


-Jon

[Sogturtle]

Jon~

I hate to tell you this but it gets worse from there... I had the same conclusions as you a few weeks back. What really ticks me is this is his GRANDDAUGHTER slamming his best work!!! On a scale of One to Ten, I give it about a three!!! What a letdown!!

[J Lee]

Sounds like it was written to please the book publisher and copy editors (the publishing industry has become notoriously PC over the past 20 years) instead of being targeted to the audience that would be the most likely to buy the book. Maybe she should have changed the title to "Ub Iwerks -- My Horridly Racist Grandad"

;)

[happyheathen]

Originally posted by Jon Cooke
I bought a copy of the Ub Iwerks biography, The Hand Behind the Mouse, at Walt Disney World last month...

Anything sold by Disney to be flattering (or even honest) about UB?

[Sogturtle]

Welllll John and Dave~

There's a final coda to it that neither of us mentioned... It's
PUBLISHED by Disney!!! Need we say anymore...???

[J Lee]

There's a final coda to it that neither of us mentioned... It's PUBLISHED by Disney!!! Need we say anymore...???

Hyperion? Figures ... there as bad as anybody, and the ironic thing is the people who run it would have HATED Walt, at least from a political/ideological standpoint.

[happyheathen]

Originally posted by Sogturtle
Welllll John and Dave~


It seems Jon is now 'John Cookie'?

d

(and I thought I had problems w/ being called 'David')

[David Gerstein]

Actually...

I think the Ub biography is more flattering than you're making it sound. Does it spend more proportional space than, say, Maltin discussing cartoons' stereotypes? The *overall* impression one gets is that regardless of stereotypes, the authors consider Ub's cartoons better and more creative than Disney's of the period (Ub's LITTLE RED HEN being superior to Disney's WISE LITTLE HEN, to give one stance that the text takes).
This is an impression that, it seems, is also held by the book's sister documentary film: I haven't seen that film yet, but some reviews I read encapsulate it as saying that Ub's 1930s cartoons were, once again, more creative and interesting than Walt's. Oh, and that Ub was the real creator of Mickey Mouse.
I like the work of both Walt and Ub (and have not decided whom I think was most instrumental in Mickey... or whether that was Floyd Gottfredson!), so I won't take a personal critical stance here. If I'm critical of the Iwerks bio in any way, it's mainly for making a few errors. Chief among them, I've never seen Comicolor Cartoons referred to as Comicolor Classics (as they're called throughout this text) anywhere before: on screen or on their posters. I can only imagine the authors have confused the series title with Max Fleischer's contemporary Color Classics.

David Gerstein

[Sogturtle]

Happyheathen (Dave)~

The "John" I referred to (in "... John and Dave") was J. Lee NOT Jon Cooke. So I'm sorry but I DID NOT morph him into John Cookie. And in further news... :)

[Sogturtle]

A Turtle's-eye view of this tome a few weeks back...

06-05-2001 06:10 PM & 06-05-2001 11:55 PM

Ub Iwerks' biography by a family member...

Ub's biography "The Hand Behind The Mouse" (co-written by his youngest grand-daughter Leslie). And I hate to be negative... but tain't good. A piddling TOTAL of 59 pages (out of 229 actual pages of text) is devoted to Ub's wonderful "decade of decadence" away from the Disney clan... The 10 years where he and his associates created marvelously funny and macabre little films, even as D*sn*y grew more and more bland. She takes grandpa Ub to task for his films of the Thirties (more mega-ugly political-correctness)... The very films EVERYONE ELSE hails as classics!! There's one small section of pictures with nothing special amongst them (we get to see author Leslie as a baby in Ub's arms...). To be fair it actually has a couple of small pieces of NEW animation info but otherwise it hews the [general] line that D*sn*y was the greatest. She of course likes to credit Ub with everything in the silent era, which is nice but not true. And she then totally whitewashes the non-forgiveness given him by Walt for quitting and then returning 10 years later (Roy was more forgiving). Ohhhhh and the publisher of this tome is... Disney!!!

Ub is WAAAAAAAY overdue for a biography. Friz Freleng once said that everything he knew about animation he learned "from Ub or from Hugh". I had high, high hopes for this book, and it's very sad that this ranks as something like a "stop-gap" measure. The authors clearly idolize Ub but have failed to create a really fine biography of a great, great person. The facts appear to be ESSENTIALLY right, but it is soooo sparse in so many ways. Besides having only one (very tired) photo of Ub's early production staff, it also VERY CONSPICUOUSLY omits any and all drawings and artwork (no frame blow-ups even) that Ub (or his staff) worked on at his own studio. (C'MON Leslie Iwerks, even I have Ub artwork and I'm not even family!!!). In fact the only animation artwork at all is an Ub Mickey Mouse storyboard from"The Kactus Kid". But this is just the insult... The real injury is FAILING to include a COMPREHENSIVE FILMOGRAPHY with any and all known credits for Ub's gazillion-and-one films (or a filmography at all!!!). For a book co-authored by an insider, this is (at best) a very mediocre biography. A great shame his sons didn't write this critter, at least they knew him first-hand.

[Jon Cooke]

Sorry, Soggy... guess I must have missed your review. I hadn't noticed there was no filmography yet. I still wish there was more on the Iwerks studios films and more artwork, though.

There ARE a few interesting bits in this book, and it certainly isn't the worst animation book on my bookshelf (I think that honor is toss up between Tom and Jerry: 50 Years of Cat and Mouse, Chuck Jones: A Flurry of Drawings, and Animating Culture).


-Jon

[Sogturtle]

Originally posted by Jon Cooke
Sorry, Soggy... guess I must have missed your review. I hadn't noticed there was no filmography yet. I still wish there was more on the Iwerks studios films and more artwork, though.

There ARE a few interesting bits in this book, and it certainly isn't the worst animation book on my bookshelf (I think that honor is toss up between Tom and Jerry: 50 Years of Cat and Mouse, Chuck Jones: A Flurry of Drawings, and Animating Culture).


-Jon

S'alright Jon!! I think exceedingly few folk bothered to read my little book review. Twas vacation time!!

One other thing that is egregiously missing from this baby, happens to be footnotes and real references...

I agree with you that there are a FEW interesting bits, but they are SO FEW and SO FAR BETWEEN. The most important is that Rollin "Ham" Hamilton chose to go with Ub before jumping ship to Harman-Ising. This of course explains why Hamilton's name is missing from the first few Looney Tunes (as second only to Friz in importance it was VERRRRY noticeable). And when Ub closed up shop he asked Hugh Harman for help interceding with Walt. Hugh told him to do it directly with Ben Sharpsteen, thus Ub found himself being paid $75 a week as a checker... The next that I can think of right now was that for LONG years afterward Ub and wife used to visit with/pal around with Ben "Bugs" Hardaway and wife. But these are the gems of the whole book.

The ALL-TIME worst animation book would likely be Ralph Stephenson's (The Art Of Animation). Hopefully that's the right title (read it many-a-year-ago). Sheer claptrap with MASSIVE errors.

[TServo2049]

Name some errors in Ralph Stephenson's book. I'm interested in how inaccurate some animation books are.

[J Lee]

Name some errors in Ralph Stephenson's book.

My two favorite Warner related ones:

1.) When he called Elmer Fudd a "Magoo-like character" -- really not a mistake but Elmer arrived nine years before Magoo did.

2.) When Ralph misnamed Robert McKimson's "Mixed Master" as "Mixed Bastard." My personal favorite.