Mickey Mouse's 50th Birthday

Credits

Compiled by
Davidthelogohunter

Background

In 1978, Walt Disney Productions celebrated Mickey Mouse's 50th anniversary. As part of the birthday celebration, Disney created a special animated logo, which appeared on theatrical releases and re-issues. Later, the logo was modified to be used as the logo for Disney's new home media division.

Logo (1978, 1980, 1993)

• 
• 
  UK variant
• 
  Italian variant
• 
  Textless variant

Visuals: A solid red Mickey appears with purple dashed outlines surrounding it. The Mickey starts to rotate. After a while, the text "Congratulating Mickey Mouse on his 50th Birthday!", in white and in a fancy font, zooms in. After a few seconds, it zooms in towards the screen until vanishing from sight, and the top and bottom halves of the 1978 Buena Vista logo wipe in over the logo.

Trivia: The rotating "Neon Mickey" is a silhouetted image of the animatronic Mickey conductor that was used in the former Walt Disney World/Tokyo Disneyland attraction "The Mickey Mouse Revue".

Variants:

• On British theatrical releases, the text reads "Happy birthday MICKEY On Your Golden Jubilee".
• On Italian theatrical and Super 8 releases, the text reads "Congratulazioni Topolino per il tuo Giubileo d'Oro".
• The Italian Variant was also briefly spotted for a split second before cutting to something else and then to a blue screen.
• A textless variant also exists.
• A German Version exists where it instead reads "FROHE FERIEN", when the Buena Vista logo wipes in over the Logo, it instead reads "DIE GROSSEN DISNEY-SOMMER-FESTWOCHEN 1980". The animation is skipped by a few seconds before the text zooms out.
• On the Disney+ print of The Cat From Outer Space, the logo is shot in 1.33:1 format, since black bars can be seen on both sides of the screen.

Technique: Rotoscoped cel animation.

Audio: A loud orchestral fanfare, composed by longtime Disney composer Buddy Baker.

Audio Trivia: The score for this logo is the first track of the Intrada release of Return from Witch Mountain titled "Main Title - Pt. 1 '1978 Mickey Mouse Birthday Logo' (Buddy Baker)". It lacks the string section and the last timpani beat at the end, likely meaning it’s an alternate take.

Audio Variants:

• On the DVD and Disney+ prints of The Cat from Outer Space, the logo is silent due to the fact they were unable to restore the audio.
• On a bootleg reel of the Italian Super 8 release Happy Birthday Mickey Mouse, the last part of the music from the 1987 Walt Disney Home Video logo is used.
• On the 1980 German film festival commercial, a German announcer is heard.

Availability: Seen on 1978 theatrical releases such as The Cat from Outer Space and Return from Witch Mountain (it is intact on current releases of the former, including the Disney+ print, but is deleted from Anchor Bay releases), and theatrical re-issues such as Pinocchio and The Jungle Book.

• It is also seen on Italian Super 8 releases such as Peter Pan.
• The textless variant can be found on the Venezuelan VHS release of Mickey's Golden Jubilee.
• VHS releases of The Cat From Outer Space (either from the original 1983 VHS release or 1994 Walt Disney Classics release) do not feature this logo at all, it instead would either show the 1978 Walt Disney Home Entertainment Logo (from the 1983 release) or the Walt Disney Classics Logo (from the 1994 release).
• This special logo also makes an appearance on the 1980 German film festival commercial.

Legacy: Contrary to the 1978 WDHE and 1981 WDHV logos, this does not receive as much negative community reception, thanks to the brighter color scheme.