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Director: Ford Beebe
Release Date: 1941
Stars: The Three Little Pigs
Rating: ★★★★½
Review:
Before The United States were dragged into the war by Japan’s attack on Pearl harbor, December 7, 1941, Walt Disney Studio already had made four propaganda shorts for the Canadian government.
Canada, had declared war on Nazi Germany on September 10, 1939, a week after the United Kingdom, following Germany’s invasion of Poland, September 1.
‘The Thrifty Pig’ is the first of Disney’s four propaganda films commissioned by the Canadian government to persuade their citizens to buy war bonds to invest in the war effort. The other three being ‘7 Wise Dwarfs‘ (1941), ‘Donald’s Decision‘ (1942) and ‘All Together‘ (1942). It’s also Disney’s first propaganda cartoon.
‘The Thrifty pig’ consists of two parts, The first part cleverly reuses animation from Walt Disney’s most famous short, ‘Three Little Pigs‘ (1933), but in this shortened version the wolf wears a Nazi costume, the bricks are made of war bonds and the union jack is waving at the wise pig’s house. The only new animation is when the wolf’s blows reveal war bonds beneath the plaster and when the wise pig says “these bricks not only stop his blowing, they will also get him going”.
The second part is more overtly propagandistic and uses limited animation of war machines and slogans to persuade the public to buy “more and more war certificates”. The end shot, where a plane shoots the words ‘Invest in Victory’ on the screen’ is the most powerful image of the complete film.
This two part formula would be reused in all succeeding propaganda films that had to persuade the public to invest in the governmental war industry. Apart from the Canadian commissions, we see this structure in ‘The New Spirit‘ (1942) and ‘The Spirit of ’43‘ (1943), which had to persuade American citizens to pay their income taxes in time.
Watch ‘The Thrifty Pig’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Ben Sharpsteen
Release Date: July 21, 1942
Stars: The Three Little Pigs (in a cameo)
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
Arguably the most ridiculous of all war time propaganda cartoons, ‘Food Will Win the War’ tells us about the successes of American agriculture.
A bombastic narrator makes all kinds of outrageous comparisons to illustrate the farmer’s huge production. Examples are baking all fruits of America into one big pie or frying all America’s meat on four Vesuvius volcanoes. The result is so absurd and its message so out to lunch that the short is actually great fun to watch.
Throughout the cartoon the animation is very limited, almost absent. The limited animation gives the short a poster-like quality. Full animation is limited to four short sequences:
1) a bowling ball bowling down skittles which resemble Hitler, Mussolini and a Japanese general
2) a giant pie thrown at the earth
3) Chickens laying eggs
4) The three little pigs leading an army of pigs.
‘Food Will Win the War’ was the last animated short directed by Ben Sharpsteen. In the 1940s he had moved more and more towards production. He would supervise the production of a.o. ‘Fun and Fancy Free‘ (1947), ‘Cinderella‘ (1950) and ‘Alice in Wonderland‘ (1951) before moving to live action, working on Disney’s True-Life Adventures (1948-1960). He retired in 1962.
Watch ‘Food Will Win the War’ yourself and tell me what you think:
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