Epics, Spectacles, and Blockbusters: A Hollywood History Book

Honestly, this is probably a four star book but I have a bit of a soft spot if not just an immense amount of respect for Pixar as a company and (nearly all of) their movies (I'm looking at your, Cars...). The Pixar Touch is a very nice getting-to-know-you type of book, going through all of Pixar's history in less than three hundred pages. Of course the entire story can be summarized by mentions of Pixar software/hardware, Steve Jobs, and Disney drama.

Nevertheless, Price manages to expand on all things Pixar without overwhelming the reader with mundane details and irrelevant tangents. Most chapters are focused on a particular aspect of Pixar's history in chronological order, and no new character or product is introduced without sufficient background. But, the fact that Price never delved into a topic without at least a few paragraphs about where a prominent character came from or the origins of a particular story ends up disrupting the flow of narrative. For example, Price may be describing the strained relationship between Disney and Pixar (or rather Eisner and Jobs) only to suddenly jump to the introduction of Bob Iger by detailing his background and how he came to work at Disney. Understandably Iger was the next logical point in the story as the resolution to the Disney/Pixar conflict, but the immediate jump was surprising.

Minor issues aside, The Pixar Touch was a really great book to read - short but pretty much all-encompassing, covering not just Pixar and its head executives but also details and background about Pixar techniques (though thankfully only at a high level), Pixar movies, etc. If there was one sole reason for me to justify bringing it down to four stars, it would be that the timeline for this story only went from Toy Story to Ratatouille, and the content for Ratatouille was kept to a bare minimum. I would have loved to hear more about Up and even (what I consider to be) the highly underrated title Brave, but that's probably asking for too much. I got all I asked for and as a side effect I now have an unrelenting urge to watch Pixar movies for the rest of the day.

Also, The Incredibles needs a sequel. Just do it, Brad!