70th Anniversary Screening

Animal Farm

+ intro by Jez Stewart, curator, BFI National Archive

On the 70th anniversary of its London premiere, Halas & Batchelor’s animated feature remains the definitive adaptation of George Orwell’s allegorical ‘fairy story’.

  • Directors

    John Halas and Joy Batchelor

  • With voices of

    Maurice Denham, Gordon Heath

  • UK 1954. 72min

  • Digital

  • Certificate

    U

Britain’s first animated feature film received its premiere in New York in late December 1954. It was a nod towards its American financing, both official and unofficial, as a clandestine contribution to the cultural cold war. But the film’s production was very much rooted in the British animation industry, and its story of power, corruption and the control of ‘truth’ remains as compelling and relevant to modern eyes.