Education for Death
| Education for Death | |
|---|---|
| File:Education for Death.jpg | |
| Distributed by | RKO |
Release date |  15 January 1943 |
Running time | 10 minutes |
| Language | English naration with German dialogue |
Education for Death: The Making of the Nazi is an animated short film produced by Walt Disney and released on January 15, 1943 by RKO Radio Pictures. It was directed by Clyde Geronimi and principally animated by Ward Kimball. The short is (loosely) based on the book (ISBN 0-374-98905-2) by Gregor Ziemer. The cover of that book appears as the short's title card.
Synopsis
The film features the story of Little Hans, a German boy born and raised in Nazi Germany, who is educated to become a merciless soldier.
A German couple proves to a Nazi supreme judge that they are of pure Aryan blood and agrees to give their son, whom they name Hans at the approval of the judge, into the service of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party and was given a copy of "Germany's bestseller," Mein Kampf for theirs to keep as a reward for their service to Hitler. As Hans grows, he hears a distorted version of Sleeping Beauty depicting Hitler as the knight in shining armor rescuing Sleeping Beauty, a huge obese Valkyrie representing Germany, from a wicked witch, representing Democracy. With this kind of distortion, Hans becomes greatly fascinated with Hitler as he and the rest of the younger members of the Hitler Youth give a portrait of Hitler dressed as a knight the Hitler salute.
Then Hans becomes sick and bedridden. While his mother prays for him, knowing it will only be a matter of time before the authorities come and take him away to serve Hitler, a Nazi officer bangs on the door to take Hans away, but his mother says he is sick and needs care. The officer orders her to heal her son quickly and have him ready to be taken away. He orders her not to do anything more to him that will cause him to lose heart and be weak, explaining that a soldier must show no emotion, mercy, or feelings whatsoever as he grows to become a soldier for Hitler. Hans eventually recovers and resumes his "education" in a school classroom, where Hans and the rest of his classmates, after giving portraits of Hitler, Göring, and Goebbels the Hitler salute, watch as the teacher draws a cartoon on the blackboard of a rabbit being eaten by a fox, prompting Hans to feel sorry for the rabbit. The teacher, furious over the remark, orders Hans to sit in the corner wearing a dunce cap. As Hans sits in the corner as punishment, he hears the rest of the classmates "correctly" interpret the cartoon as "weakness has no place in a soldier" and "the strong shall rule the weak". This sparks Hans to recant his remark, and agrees that the weak must be destroyed.
Hans then takes part in a book-burning crusade, burning any books that oppose Hitler, replacing the Holy Bible with Mein Kampf and the crucifix with a Nazi sword, and burning a Catholic Church. Hans then spends the next several years "Marching and heiling, marching and heiling!" until he reaches his teens still "marching and heiling" until he becomes the "Good Nazi" embroiled in hatred towards anyone else who opposes Hitler, "sees nothing but what the party wants him to see, says nothing but what the party wants him to say, and he does no more than the party wants him to do."
In the end, Hans and the rest of the soldiers march off to war only to fade into rows of graves. Thus Hans's education is complete. "The education... for death", leaving the viewers with the moral of the story: "... Hitler got Germany on her feet, climbed into the saddle... and took her for a ride."
Intended as anti-Nazi propaganda during World War II, the film is rarely shown today, but it is featured on the DVD Walt Disney Treasures: On the Front Lines, a compilation of Disney's wartime shorts released on May 18, 2004.
The dialogue of the characters is in German, neither subtitled nor directly translated by Art Smith's lone English language narration. A voice track of Adolf Hitler in full demagogic rant is used in a torchlight rally scene. A sequence follows in which Hans becomes a Nazi soldier along with other Hitler Youth.
"Education for Death" was not the only anti-Nazi film made by Walt Disney. There were several others, such as Reason and Emotion and Der Fuehrer's Face, a cartoon short in which Donald Duck has a nightmare about working in a Nazi munitions plant.
