A couple of downer cartoons, Peace on Earth and it's remake Good Will to Men are about nothing less than the end of civilization as we know it as the human race annihilates itself in a world war. With people now extinct, little cartoon animals take over and rebuild the world.
Peace on Earth is actually very well made. Apparently the director Hugh Harman felt it wasn't enough to entertain people with cute cartoon animals running around, he had a few big thoughts about the fate of mankind. This film is reasonably effective but after all this human slaughter watching little bunnies hoping around rebuilding some kind of animal civilization is a little off putting. It's still worth a look. When Peace on Earth came out in 1939 the world was about to be plunged into World War II so this film wasn't that far off the mark. A real oddball of a film.
Peace on Earth was obviously influential since it was remade in 1955, in fashionable widescreen called Good Will to Men. In this version mankind essentially destroys itself with nuclear weapons again leaving more cute little cartoon animals to rebuild the world.
Both these films are set at Christmas time to really drive home the "thou hall not kill" and "peace on earth" stuff to an audience. However cartoon mice singing Christmas carols at the end of these films is kind of weird. In general the 1939 version of this story is more visually interesting than the remake,
Peace on Earth runs 9 minutes, Good Will to Men runs 8 minutes
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