Education for Death (1943)

Director:

Clyde Geronimi

Writer:

Gregor Ziemer (book)

Release Date:

15 January 1943 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Short | Comedy | Drama | War

Plot:

A young German boy is indoctrinated into conforming with the Nazi social mindset

Plot Keywords:

Nazi | Hitler | Propaganda | Anti Nazism | WWII

Cast

Adolf Hitler	...	Himself (archive footage)
Art Smith	...	Narrator

Also Known As:

The Story of One of Hitlers Children as Adapted from: Education for Death - The Making of the Nazi (USA) (complete title)

Runtime:

10 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | German

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

USA:Approved (certificate #8732) | Canada:G (Nova Scotia) | UK:A

Company:

Walt Disney Productions

Trivia:

Along with Der Fuehrer's Face (1942) Disney once said that this film will never be released again in any format. However, both films have been released on a DVD set chronicling the studio's WWII films in 2004.

Quotes:

Narrator: Remember the fairy tale of the Sleeping Beauty? Hans was taught that the wicked witch... was Democracy. And Sleeping Beauty, who can she be? Aha, here comes the prince!
[the Prince rides forward on his horse to Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries." The Witch jumps out of a window]
Narrator: The Prince is victorious! Democracy has fled. He breaks the magic spell with a kiss. The Princess... is Germany.
[the Princess is revealed as a buxom Germania in a Valkyrie helmet]
Narrator: And the brave, handsome knight... you know who he is.
[...]

Movie Connections:

Featured in A Conversation with Joe Grant (2004) (V)

Chilling. And somehow still relevant.

In this dark Disney short (directed by the same guy who did Lady and the Tramp and Peter Pan) we see a young German couple take their newborn baby to be registered as one of 'Hitler's Children'. They have to prove their ethnic origin all the way back to their great-grandparents to authenticate the child's pure Aryan blood. One of Hitler's biggest mistakes is the fact that blue eyes/blonde hair is a recessive gene and is 3 out of 4 times dominated by dark eyes/hair.

The parents must choose a name for the child but can only take what is not already chosen from 'the list'. They choose Hans, which ends up being okay. Soon the child is in school and is taught warped versions of typical values. Hans is told of a fox hunting a rabbit. He takes sympathy on the poor rabbit and is ridiculed and tormented by his teacher and classmates. The lesson of 'only the strong survive' is brutally hammered into him.

And when Hans gets sick his parents are warned to cease all 'mollycoddling' and he better get well quickly. Hitler's children do no get sick and those who do are taken away and never heard from again.

More and more evil lesson and hailing the Fuehrer follow. Soon Hans is a grown man, marching in line with all the other soldiers. Neither of them are individuals. They are robots believing what Hitler wants them to believe. Doing what Hitler wants them to do. Saying what Hitler wants them to say. None of them know joy, happiness or laughter.

And soon Hans is dead. Sympathy is felt for the child within who died a long time ago.

It's alarming when you consider that this may feel far-fetched yet in today's society we are still reared and duped by lying world leaders. We still believe nonsense we read in tabloids and fear and xenophobia still overpower common sense.

A very chilling cartoon.