Animal Farm and Orwell

Weird experimental video where I tried to be an Egirl explaining about Orwell and Animal Farm. A lot of good response and took first prize at a local film maker's group.

How did we get here? Well, not here. I mean here point to side. Just like the creative team behind the most recent adaptation of Orwell’s classic dystopian political allegory sold out to tell a story that is positive and uplifting, I’ve decided to become a temporary e-girl and sell my sense of self to the chat…oink oink thank you chat. I’m here to be your own personal Squealer…but more honest. I’m here to tell all you animals the truth about Orwell and why the latest adaptation is off the walls outrageous in all the wrong ways.

Let’s just dive right in. I think we can all agree Andy Serkis’s Animal Farm feels like a mess. I am honestly so confused. Who reads the original dark and distressing novella and thinks this would be a hell of a lot better as a kids movie with fart jokes and pop ballads. I mean that's like taking Handmaid's Tale and turning it into a 90’s style sitcom POINT TO SIDE. I mean, why not? There’s a group of friends who hate their jobs and have a let’s say messy love life. I mean can you imagine? LOOK UP DREAMING

From the trailer and promo surrounding the new Animal Farm film we see lots of silliness and the big baddies are over consumers. There is no slow devolution into a dark world worse than before. There is also a shoehorned piglet led revolution so the bad guys lose and we have a happy ending. Now, with any ordinary kids movie this would be fine, but when you are adapting a book with a very dark, dystopic, warning about absolute tyrannical authority and the lack of workers rights you water down the message so much it is not the same thing. Agreed, chat. He’d be spinning faster than DiCaprio’s ring at the end of inception. The problem with this adaptation is the film was shaped to fit the very specific message of the studio that distributed the final product–or at the very least it shows how much an original idea can devolve into its own destruction–you know kind of like a group of revolutionary pigs who wanted change for all animals but soon discovered the taste of power and changed the rules to fit their needs and wants. STARE OF BEFORE SMILING AND GETTING BACK INTO IT

Animal Farm is brought to you by Angel Studios whose mission statement is very clear to audiences and investors alike. They state in a letter to film fans, “We’re building a home for stories that amplify light or as we call it our North Star. How do we define light? True, honest, noble, just, authentic, lovely, admirable, and excellent.” They go one to focus on desperation, despair, and division that permeates our world and how their North Star stories will provide much needed hope and light. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that message and general ethos, but taking a story that was meant to be dark and end on a serious tone, makes no sense. It takes the author's intent and throws it in the trash.

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We can’t understand the issue with molding this story like a ball of clay without understanding who Orwell was and what he believed in. George Orwell was born Eric Blair, a son of a civil servant living in India. He moved to England with his mother to have a proper English education while his father stayed in India until he retired–only coming back to England once to literally make another baby before bouncing back to India. When it came time for college, Blair didn’t have good enough grades for a scholarship and his dad refused to pay for his schooling, so he joined the colonial police service, and served in Burma for five years. This would be his first time really waking up to the injustices that surrounded him. Years later, in his first novel, Burmese Days, Orwell wrote of the dark side of the British Raj describing corruption and bigotry with his main character stating, “The time comes when you burn with hatred of your own countrymen, when you long for a native rising to drown their Empire in blood.”

He returned home on leave and decided to leave the police and do what he called “tramping” and mingled with the poorest of classes and people throughout England and then later Paris. He wanted to understand their lives and write about their political and societal oppression and shine a light on it much like American writer, Jack London. After all this tramping, no not like that, [insert silly image] he started writing and took on the mantle of George Orwell–just in case his writings failed miserably he wouldn’t sully his christian name. The rest is basically history. He writes Down and Out in Paris and London, Burmese Days, a bunch of others I won’t list right now, and eventually Animal Farm, and 1984. Aw, thanks for the bits SNOWDEEZBALLS! Silly e-girl, piggy dance and oink for virtual bucks. Maybe sigh a little after and smile before moving on to the next section.

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Nearly a decade before publishing Animal Farm, Orwell spent six months in Spain in 1936 joining militias who were actively fighting against General Fransico Franco, a fascist dictator working to control Spain during the Spanish Civil War. Orwell aligned himself with POUM or the Partido Obrero de Unifacacion Marxista. This anarchist group wanted to see an end to their current government and for people and communities to govern themselves. Since this militia group couldn’t fight fascism on their own, they did join forces with communists closely aligned with Stalin. Unfortunately, Owell’s time was cut short as he took a bullet in the throat. He and his wife fled Spain and returned to England. His time in Spain was not in vain. It became a formative experience that shaped how he thought a more egalitarian society could flourish. In his own words, Orwell states: “It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle. Above all, there was a belief in the revolution and the future, a feeling of having suddenly emerged into an era of equality and freedom. Human beings were trying to behave as human beings and not cogs in the capitalist machine.” Speaking of being a cog, thanks for the sub, GEORGE OINKWELL! Let’s hog down and get some pig emotes in the chat! Oink, oink, oink, oink!

Back to the farm, unfortunately in Spain, the Stalin backed group started fighting with POUM calling them the real fascists and soon took control as the main opposing force against the real fascists in the National Party. So what does this have to do with Mr. Jones's Manor Farm? Well, the book Animal Farm was written as a fable of sorts warning readers of the dangers of revolutions that lead into totalitarian rule. Where leaders continue to oppress the oppressed in order to have more power. The original British subtitle was “Animal Farm: A Fairy Story” illustrating that this was meant as a lesson of the dangers of dictatorship. It was an allegorical satire very much against Stalin and the form of communism existing in Russia. Orwell writes in an introduction for a Ukrainian edition of the novella about wanting to tell a story that exposed the myth of the soviet union that would be easy to understand. He claimed that the actual story idea didn’t come to him until one day he saw a little boy driving a horse and cart and whipping said horse. He states: “​​It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their strength we should have no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat." Orwell wanted to expose the myth of the soviet union to the masses. He felt that countries like Britain, and the U.S., and other powers believed that the Russian Revolution truly led to a workers paradise and not a Stalin tyrannical regime that exploited said workers. As Orwellian biographer Michael Sheldon writes: “What better way to fight that myth than to create a mythical story of animals whose successful revolt against tyranny degenerates into a greedy struggle for power?”

What do we see in the novella? Old Major standing in for Karl Marx or even Russian revolutionary Lenin. Napoleon as Stalin, Snowball as Trotsky, and hardworking animals like Boxer the horse standing in for the Russian laborers.

Speaking of Boxer the noble and hardworking shire horse, what better way to illustrate his devastating death on the big screen than to have him die of exhaustion saving a human rather than at the hands of overworking for Napoleon's ridiculous Windmill. [insert short clip from movie]. One of the many ways this current Hollywood adaptation has taken an axe to the original story. The original version of the death symbolizes the grueling hardships of laborers. Workers literally being worked to death for no clear reason. This sanitized version of the story has a four legged Boxer making a heroic sacrifice to save a two legged abuser. Four legs good. Two legs bad [include pic of the animal farm rules]. Hollywood is unable to shine a light on the exploited working class. Instead, they want to show how there is a hero in all of us. We can all triumph as good, honest, living beings. Quick, grab Boxer a cape on his way to the glue factory!

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Why can’t Hollywood adapt this wildly successful novella read by countless middle and high schoolers? A book that launched Orwell’s career and solidified him as a critical voice warning us of dystopian futures. Two words: happy ending. The idea is synonymous with going to the movies, right? Why waste money on something that won’t leave you at least mildly happy at the end. Of course there are movies that pride themselves on sticking to an unhappy ending and refuse to put on rose colored glasses. Take for instance three movies, all books before, that keep with the original unhappy ending: The Boy in Striped Pajamas has both kids (jewish and non jewish) dying in a gas chamber. Atonement reveals the main character never atoned for her lies and the lovers were never reunited. Never Let Me Go has all three characters slowly dying and facing their very real mortality with each forced organ donation. So it is possible to end a movie with tears. With feeling a little down. Maybe learning about something in that darkness.

However, apparently we can’t with this dystopic novella. Nope. Animals always need to rebel. Napoleon needs to have power ripped from his hands or at the very least leave him dead. Let’s look shall we? Animal Farm 1954, yup the one funded in part by the CIA, ends with an animal led revolution taking down all the pigs and Benjamin the donkey standing proud over the crushed regime. Animal Farm 1999, the hallmark one with the Jim Henson animatronics, yup those creepy, uncanny valley animatronics, ends with Napoleon dead and a new family moving in and Jessie the border collie dog promising to not let the same mistakes happen again. Animal Farm 2026, yup the one directed by Gollum, ends with Lucky the piglet's revolution and promise to keep all animals equal, not just some. In an interview with USA Today, Serkis defends his major edits to the story. He believes the “Fairy Story” subtitle meant the story was aimed at children. He wanted a softer story with less violence to give them a blueprint of sorts stating: “...we wanted the next generation, the kids who we hopefully are going to be watching this film, to at least have the ability to question what they should do next time around. History will inevitably repeat itself.” The question I then have for Serkis is if, and that is a questionable if, if this story was meant for children, then why not leave the original messaging. Orwell’s true message for young minds? Why sanitize and soften and leave with warm fuzzies?

Why can’t we just have a faithful adapted ending? The bleak blur between man and pig. Two legs vs. four. The hardworking animals who are forced to work to death with no hope for a retired, peaceful life on a sunny hill. A once powerful and motivating revolution soured by power and corruption. stares into the abyss and quickly smiles I don’t know, but I do love some naughty juice and would love just a few more subs before this stream is over! One more hog dance for the road?

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