Book Review: The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Book Review: The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame

The Hunchback of Notre Dame is inspired by Victor Hugo's literary masterpiece Notre-Dame de Paris. This art book is very heavy into character development and the historic influences. The first chapter is on Victor Hugo and his story of Notre Dame, including a short biography. There's much of how the characters are created and influenced by Victor Hugo's life, and the little changes Disney made to adapt it as a movie.

Throughout the book, there are sections introduced writing about the cultural settings. E.g. About Notre Dame, Gypsies, how people hold feasts, etc.

Character writeup are for Esmeralda, Quasimodo, Frollo (the villain) and other miscellaneous characters. There are plenty of accompanying character sketches and film stills. Characteristics for main characters are laid out, and the role they play in the film explained in detail.

There's a chapter on the architecture and the drawings are exquisite, as expected from Paris. The text explains how the buildings are designed to convey the mood suitable for the movie.

Finally, there's the talk on the overall theme of the movie, the light vs the dark. They are placed in the movie as different metaphors, like light and shadow, good vs evil. Every character in the film is an outcast in his/her circumstance.

The book's focus is on the characters and storytelling.

Special thanks to Kelvin Chan for providing the book for this short review.

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The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame - 10

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Comments

Hi, thanks for video reviewing this book (which is one of my favorite Classic Disney movies), which I first saw your review on Amazon.com. I bought this book online and it is really good with the content of its artwork. Do you happen to know if they ever made an art of book for Beauty and the Beast, or if they are planning to? Thanks.

Actually, there was a soft cover release of Beauty and the Beast: The Making of an Animated Classic back in 1991 - though it is rather short and includes a lot less than the Disney Art of books. However, Disney is apparently releasing a book called Tale as Old as Time: The Art and Making of Beauty and the Beast in the spring which appears to be more like the art books we all love :D

https://www.amazon.com/Tale-Old-Time-Making-Beauty/dp/1423124812/ref=sr…

Hi!
Thanks for doing all these awesome revies! They really help. Could you tell me exactly what size The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame comes as? It's not miniature, correct?
Thanks so much!

Thanks so much for this nice review. It was such a great pleasure and privilege to write this and two other Disney animated books. Your link was sent to me and I just stopped in to say that I'm gratified to hear that the book was useful and enjoyable.

All best to you!

Stephen Rebello

Which artbook of The Art of The Hunchback of Notre Dame did you review: the one brown hardcover version w/ gold lettering, or the hardcover that shows the sky with Notre Dame Cathedral building?

Hi! Thank you for reviewing, your website is a great resource!
I noticed the video was removed from YouTube and was wondering if it's due to copyright issue?

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