a parable of rodents and men

December 24, 2007 8:37 AM

Peace on Earth- 1939 Disney animation directed by Hugh Harman. And Goodwill to Men, a 1955 remake by Hanna-Barbera.
posted by madamjujujive (30 comments total)

Hugs, kisses & holiday wishes to all my fellow Mefites!
posted by madamjujujive at 8:38 AM on December 24, 2007

Apropos. Happy Holidays!
posted by zerobyproxy at 9:09 AM on December 24, 2007

Thanks.
posted by nax at 9:10 AM on December 24, 2007

This is a wonderful cartoon. I had a 10th generation video tape of this years ago, the youtube video actually looks better!

Small clarification: although Hugh Harman and his partner Rudolf Ising (Harman-Ising) did work for Disney, this cartoon was produced for MGM. Wiki here and here.

Thanks for the post, I'd forgotten all about this.
posted by marxchivist at 9:22 AM on December 24, 2007

I actually were going to post these two videos. Thanks for beating me to the punch.

The sad thing is, these two films are still relevant.
posted by champthom at 10:18 AM on December 24, 2007

It looked to me very much as if Mama Squirrel deliberately left that pincushion there for Grandpa Squirrel to sit on. This bespeaks a level of suppressed rage and violence that bodes ill for an indefinite continuation of peace. Also, THOU SHALT NOT KILL is, shall we say, an unrealistic commandment for animals. How is Mr. Owl supposed to get by without eating Li'l Baby Mouse?

Great post!
posted by languagehat at 10:39 AM on December 24, 2007

Wonderful! The cartoon got me YopuTubing about and I found this:
"Raymond Briggs' The Snowman." The first half is particularly enchanting.
posted by LarryC at 10:41 AM on December 24, 2007 [2 favorites]

Thanks for the post, madamjujujive! I hadn't seen either of these before.
posted by interrobang at 10:51 AM on December 24, 2007

Wow, what a beautiful, odd cartoon; the animation in both is great, but I like the style of the first much better. I'll bet those extended scenes of bombs and fire messed up a lot of kids dreams. I'd never heard of this before, thanks!

Oh, and be sure to read the rant in the description of the 1955 version:

YouTube has been deleting a lot of videos because of claims of "copyright infringement". I ask you, HOW does it serve the public good when a video is deliberately prevented from being seen by anyone ever again? It's one thing if you are trying to make money from your own commercial releases and don't want it to be pirated, but in many cases, these videos AREN'T released in ANY commercial form (such as the "Star Wars Holiday Special") and it seems they deliberately just want to block you from ever seeing what they don't want you to see. Why? Who knows, but it seems to be pretty spiteful and selfish.

If there ever is a case of any of my videos being available in commercially-released form, I will gladly take them down from YouTube (and then go out and buy the video!). The videos I provide here are because they are not being shown anywhere else because the creators are being selfish, and that is the REAL crime, in my opinion.

A-fucking-men.
posted by mediareport at 10:59 AM on December 24, 2007 [2 favorites]

Peace on Earth was just run on TNT. The print quality was worse than the Youtube version. Much darker and lots of detail was just lost. Glad they played it though.
posted by zerobyproxy at 11:01 AM on December 24, 2007

J. Edgar Hoover was no doubt adding a few more names to his list after these came out.
posted by panamax at 11:19 AM on December 24, 2007

Brilliant post. Heavy cartoon, so beautifully rendered by Disney animators. wow. Just wow.

But Vegetarians vs MeatEaters? Immediately thought of MeFi flame wars (vegan lunch box comes to mind with some amusement).

And in a parallel universe, another squirrel with different sentiments: North Korean animation 5-1 and its parody (as if it needed one). The non-animated version.

Nice psychoanalysis languagehat. Yeah, that Mama Squirrel pulled a passive aggressive number on her dad with the pincushion. And no wonder, he barged in without knocking (obviously bad boundaries). At 1:37 she has a look of horror on her face, could be ptsd, since she apparently hadn't seen her father in a while by the surprise she expressed when he flung open the front door. At 1:49 she's looking nervous about the set up to exact her covert malice. Once pricked, his suppressed rage was almost uncontainable, I worried he'd chuck the fuzzy nippers into the fire. That's a household about to explode, for sure.

And Thou Shalt Not Kill as spoken by animals, wtf? Still, that was a damn good and ironic jab at humanity's rules to live by that aren't lived by, especially on the eve of that particular global decimation.

Seconding mediareport's emphatic amen re mhirtes12 'rant' (imo a wise statement, not a rant).

Didja know this animation was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize?...just as that monster Hitler and the Allies ripped into WWII? And voted #40 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field. It was also nominated for the 1939 Academy Award for Short Subjects (Cartoons)

Hugs, kisses & mischievously dark humored holiday wishes to you dearest madamjujujive.

May there be peace on Earth.
posted by nickyskye at 11:34 AM on December 24, 2007 [2 favorites]

Here's a very short, but very sweet, animated Christmas television bumper from 1966.
posted by Astro Zombie at 11:42 AM on December 24, 2007 [2 favorites]

Very nice, Astro Zombie. R.O. Blechman also has a short graphic novel about Saint Nicholas, The Life of Saint Nicholas As Transcribed in Pictures and Text, that's a really fun read.
posted by mediareport at 12:08 PM on December 24, 2007

Exquisite little short Astro Zombie, so not cynical. Quite refreshing and charming. Thanks.
posted by nickyskye at 12:38 PM on December 24, 2007

saw this on digg recently :P

An excerpt from the 1958 "Disneyland" TV Show episode entitled "Magic Highway USA". In this last part of the show, an exploration into possible future Transportation technologies is made.

cheers!
posted by kliuless at 12:54 PM on December 24, 2007

I've never seen either of these. They are really fantastic and a bit sad when you consider that the message bares repeating. Perhaps another remake is long overdue.
posted by cazoo at 1:48 PM on December 24, 2007

I've seen "Peace On Earth" previously, but had no idea that there was a remake. I've always found the ending of "Peace On Earth" a bit chilling given the context of the world in 1939. Sixteen years later, with the threat of the atomic bomb, it seems all the moreso.
posted by briank at 2:05 PM on December 24, 2007 [1 favorite]

Well, Hitler was a vegetarian.
posted by delmoi at 3:25 PM on December 24, 2007

If only these had been the precursors to a loooong line of children's cartoons decrying war.

I'd never seen these either, mjj. Thanks for posting.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

How is Mr. Owl supposed to get by without eating Li'l Baby Mouse?

So, languagehat, you're marching under the orange carrot banner of the Vegetarians, eh? Tghis means war!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 3:36 PM on December 24, 2007

er... this means war, that it. Unless, of course "tghis" means "war" in some Slavic language or other. Actually, I've been meaning to ask you about that. Maybe it's a Rumanian curse word?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 3:38 PM on December 24, 2007

Peace On Earth is among my very most favorite cartoons, thanks for the link.

(But how long is it before someone starts making furries jokes?)
posted by JHarris at 3:49 PM on December 24, 2007

No, no, flapjax, you misread me—that was a pro-meat statement. (Owls need to eat mousies.) So let's band together and get those vegetarians!
posted by languagehat at 4:11 PM on December 24, 2007

Onward to victory! Glorious victory!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:48 PM on December 24, 2007

Glorious, juicy, char-broiled victory!
posted by languagehat at 6:03 PM on December 24, 2007

Oh, waiter! Another char-broiled chipmunk, please. And a little roasted bluebird for my friend in the hat, here.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:14 PM on December 24, 2007 [1 favorite]

Watching the 1955 remake immediately after seeing the 1939 original, I was sitting there scratching my head going, "why bother remaking this? It's not an improvement. Why not just rebroadcast the original?" Then it got to the part about the bombs getting bigger, and I was like "ooooh right. 1939 was before Hiroshima..." Still, I preferred the bit in the original where it came down to two men being left and they shoot each other. Drives the point home better than just watching the explosions getting bigger.

I wouldn't want to see a third version. They'd probably use cgi, and the original message would get lost in the technological achievements of the medium. Besides, if you watch all five seasons of Red vs Blue you essentially get the same message, but with more profanity and less cute furry animals.
posted by ZachsMind at 2:52 AM on December 25, 2007

If there ever is a case of any of my videos being available in commercially-released form, I will gladly take them down from YouTube (and then go out and buy the video!). The videos I provide here are because they are not being shown anywhere else because the creators are being selfish, and that is the REAL crime, in my opinion.

How nice of him to take the time from posting a video about the warnings of straying from democracy toward militant fascism to whine about how the rights of an individual property owner are second to his personal desire to have whatever he wants. Did I just not go to a college where reading Ayn Rand and becoming a douchebag for your freshman year was required curriculum or something?
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 8:00 AM on December 25, 2007

If there ever is a case of any of my videos being available in commercially-released form, I will gladly take them down from YouTube (and then go out and buy the video!). The videos I provide here are because they are not being shown anywhere else

Thank you mhirtes12, would never have seen this beautiful cartoon otherwise.
posted by nickyskye at 10:22 AM on December 25, 2007

Merry Christmas Mama.
posted by riley370 at 8:58 PM on December 25, 2007 [1 favorite]