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Peace on Earth (film)
1939 American cartoon short From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Peace on Earth is a one-reel 1939 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon short directed by Hugh Harman, about a post-apocalyptic world populated only by animals, after human beings have gone extinct due to war. The film's copyright was renewed in 1966, and it will enter the American public domain on January 1, 2035.[a]
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Plot
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On Christmas Eve, two young squirrels ask their grandfather (voiced by Mel Blanc) who the "men" are in the phrase "Peace on Earth, good will to men." He recalls that men went extinct when he was a young child. Through flashbacks, he remembers them only as "monsters" with flashing eyes and "long snouts that curved down onto their stomachs" (gas masks), wearing "great, big iron pots on their heads" (helmets), and carrying "terrible-looking shooting-irons with knives on the end" (bayonets). Always going to war, finding an increasingly frivolous thing to fight over as soon as another was settled, they fight in scenes of devastation reminiscent of World War I until there are only two left. Each fatally shoots the other, and the last sight of a man is a hand curling into a fist as it slips under in a watery foxhole.
Animals — among them the young squirrel who would later become the grandfather — come out of hiding to find a Bible open to "Thou shalt not kill." An owl reads the words, taking it to be a good rulebook that men ignored. The owl finds “Ye shall rebuild the old wastes” (paraphrasing Isaiah 58:12 and 61:4). The animals agree, using men’s devices of war to build the town of Peaceville. There, in the present day, the grandchildren have fallen asleep, as their grandmother tucks them in.
Throughout the film, a Christmas carol of young squirrels, using the melody of "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing," is featured with altered lyrics emphasizing "peace on Earth, good will to men."
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Accolades
According to Hugh Harman's obituary in The New York Times[2] and Ben Mankiewicz, host of Cartoon Alley, the cartoon was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.[3] However, it is not listed in the official Nobel Prize nomination database.[4] Mankiewicz also claimed that the cartoon was the first about a serious subject by a major studio. In 1994, it was voted #40 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field.[5]
It was also nominated for the 1939 Academy Award for Short Subjects (Cartoons). It did not claim that honor (which instead went to Walt Disney's Silly Symphony The Ugly Duckling).
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Remake
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Fred Quimby, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera remade the cartoon in CinemaScope in 1955.[3] This post-World War II version of the film, entitled Good Will to Men, is narrated by a deacon mouse who tells the story to a choir of mice preparing for a Christmas service. Good Will to Men featured updated and even more destructive forms of warfare technology such as flamethrowers, bazookas and missiles, and instead of the final battle being man-to-man, humanity is driven to extinction by a mutually assured nuclear holocaust.[7] This version did not explain why humans were constantly at war, only that the deacon believed they were eager to kill each other for killing's sake; it also does not reference the line of rebuilding, instead quoting love your neighbor as yourself as the foundation for society's future. This new version was also nominated for the Best Animated Short Subject Oscar, but lost to Speedy Gonzales. This film was the last animated production for producer Fred Quimby before his retirement in May 1955.
Home media
Both Peace on Earth and Good Will to Men are included, digitally restored and uncut, on the Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Academy Awards Animation Collection DVD set. Peace on Earth is also included as an extra on the A Christmas Carol DVD and Blu-ray from Warner Brothers and The Mortal Storm Blu-ray by Warner Archive Collection.
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