ANIMAL FARM
Directed by John Halas and Joy Batchelor
Home Vision (1954) 72 min
www.homevision.com

Released to commemorate the film's 50^th anniversary, this 1954 British adaptation of Animal Farm, George Orwell's classic critique of totalitarianism, has been released to DVD. Sure, a cartoon pig may adorn the box's cover, but Babe this ain't. Most students of literature (or 1950s animation) are aware of this parable. The animals on the farm (i.e., the workers) toss out Mr. Jones, their abusive and exploitative ruler, and seek to create a society for the common good. In the process, the pigs usurp control of Animal Farm, maintain their illegitimate rule through violence (with the aid of attack dogs), and rewrite the by-laws of social organization to benefit the elite few at the expense of the many ("All animals are created equal; but some animals are created more equal than others").

Himself a socialist, Orwell intended Animal Farm as a critique of Stalinism, and as effective as it is for considering the brutality of the Stalinist regime, Animal Farm holds up incredibly well today as a critique of any form of totalitarianism—the most obvious being the role of the United States, domestically and abroad, over the past hundred years. The murderousness of Stalin's regime is well documented, but at least those in power didn't add insult to injury by becoming billionaires in the process. Consider the deaths resulting from American imperial conquest and the increasing disparities of wealth that have resulted. Whether through wars (pick one), occupations (Philippines), genocide of indigenous peoples, U.S.-backed coups (Chile, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Colombia, etc.), turning the other way (East Timor), systematic deprivation of food, water, or healthcare, fiscal austerity policies, hazardous working conditions, dumping poisons in low-income regions (and the list could go on), these people end up just as dead while corporate profits and patent protections remain sacrosanct. Sometimes the death might take a little longer (think of Boxer, the horse who is worked to death), but the effect is the same. In Animal Farm, the pigs' sense of entitlement and blatant disregard for the rules by which everyone else is expected to live, resulting in a much lower quality of life for the majority of the population, rings amazingly true of the ruling class today. It is hard to imagine a more fitting time to revisit this important cautionary tale. –EDWARD BURCH