Charles Solomon

Editor

Internationally known animation historian and critic, Charles Solomon has written over 15 books books including Enchanted Drawings: The History Of Animation, The Art of Disney’s Frozen, The Making of Peanuts Animation, and Tale as Old as Time: The Art and Making of Disney Beauty and the Beast .

Articles By Charles Solomon

DreamWorks

In Pixar’s Inside Out, Pete Docter and his crew reminded audiences of the human truth that even life’s happiest moments are inevitably tinged with sadness. The power and honesty of that message makes the theme of DreamWorks’ Trolls — that we’re all just chock full of happiness if we’ll just let it out–feel simple-minded. The […]

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Reviews

Harmony is the second of three films based on the fiction of Satoshi Ito (who wrote under the nom de plume Project Itoh). But the novel “Harmony” feels like an improbable candidate for animation. The book is an internal monologue by Tuan Kirie (Jamie Marchi, who carries the film as its de facto narrator), the […]

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Reviews

The first feature based on a novel by Project Itoh (the nom de plume of Satoshi Ito), The Empire of Corpses (2015) is a striking, if often baroque, zombie adventure. The plot seems far more complicated than it needs to be, but the cyberpunk designs, which bolster the film’s curious premise, are stunning. The Empire […]

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Reviews

Yoshiyuki Tomino’s mecha series Mobile Suit Gundam ranks among the longest-running and most successful franchises in animation history, encompassing more than three dozen broadcast series, feature films and OVA’s. Ironically, its initial run on Japanese television in 1979 earned such poor ratings, it was cancelled mid-season. The programs were recut into three theatrical features that […]

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Illumination

The Long Way North (Tout en haut du monde) is latest entry in the recent string of smaller, hand-drawn animated films from France. It’s not as polished in its look or storytelling as some of its predecessors, but it’s a promising debut for first time director Rémi Chayé, Sacha (voice by Chloé Dunn), the daughter […]

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ANIME REVIEW: “All Wishes Come True!”

Writer-director Mu Zhengyang’s All Wishes Come True! Is China’s #1 box hit of 2026, earning more than 1.5 billion yuan (US $222 million) at the mainland Chinese box office since opening on July 18. It opened in the US in August.