Tuesday 1 June 2010

ANIMAL FARM (1954)

3rd Hungarian Film Showcase in London

"Somewhere in the World"

22-28 June 2010





Animal Farm (1954)


Director: John Halas and Joy Batchelor

John Halas was a Hungarian animator who was born in Budapest, 1912. His involvement with animation lead him to work with George Pal. While working and studying in Budapest, Hungary, he's met Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Halas due to the lack of work at the hungarian studio, accepted a job in Paris where he continued the same studies he had begun in Budapest.
He moved to London in 1936, to complete a production of Music Man (1938), where he met his future wife, Joy Batchelor, who also worked on the film.


First Halas and Batchelor worked as a graphic desing partnership in the pre-war period, they were married in 1940, and in the same year they have founded the Halas and Batchelor studio to make animated advertisements for clients of the J. Walter Thompson agency, such as Kellogs and Lux.

Their work was easily identified by the combination of Disney-style characters and Eastern European aesthetics. During the war Halas and Batchelor worked on public information films for government departments. From 1940 to the late 1950's the studio was firmly associated with the production of propaganda and public information films. Its UK profile was further enhanced with the production of the Charlie-series (1946-47) for the Central Office of Information.

These films were the starting point from which the studio was able embark on its largest production: Animal Farm (1954). (Source and reference: www.ucreative.ac.uk, University for Creative Arts online; www.screenonline.org.uk/people)


"Britain’s first full length Animated feature based on George Orwell’s novel. Animal Farm captures the spirit of Orwell’s timeless political allegory with compassion. A fine example of classic animation, the film remains today as relevant as ever. The story of the animal’s uprising and their inevitable discovery that even amongst themselves some are more equal than others."


Production: John Halas, Joy Batchelor
Direction: John Halas, Joy Batchelor

Script: Joy Batchelor, Philip Stapp, Lothar Wolf

Design: John Halas, Joy Batchelor, Digby Turpin, Bernard Carey

Animation: John Reed, Arthur Humberston, Ralph Ayries, Eddy Radage, Harold Whitaker

Music: Matyas Seiber

(Information source: www.halasandbatchelor.co.uk)



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