Halas and Batchelor Cartoon Films

The embodiment of ultimate evil, a glowing orb terrorizes a young girl with bizarre stories of dark fantasy, eroticism and horror.

Animals on a farm lead a revolution against the farmers to put their destiny in their own hands. However this revolution eats their own children and they cannot avoid corruption.

Modern advice and old-fashioned values combine in this postwar animated health guide from the makers of Animal Farm.

Ever seen a snake with a moustache? The Middle East was as much an ideological as a physical battleground in the Second World War. In the midst of the conflict Halas & Batchelor were commissioned by the British Government to make four cartoons featuring a young boy Abu and his mule. They were intended to demonstrate in simple visual terms that Britain was a stout friend and the Axis powers a pernicious evil.

A particularly vicious Father Time with a hit-list in his Book of Doom seeks to wipe out characters brought to life from fabric patterns. This neat concept for a cartoon washing powder commercial can be credited to Alexander Mackendrick, who worked at the J Walter Thompson advertising agency before making films at Ealing and then Hollywood.

For centuries, the Murgatroyd family, the Baronets of Ruddigore, have been under a witch's curse — commit a crime every day, or die in agony. Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, the rightful heir, has run away to live as innocent peasant Robin Oakapple in the Cornish village of Rederring, sticking his brother Despard with the curse. But on the very day that "Robin" is to marry sweet, beautiful Rose Maybud, it all falls apart. Can Sir Ruthven outwit a picture gallery full of his ancestors' ghosts to save the day?

Set to Gilbert and Sullivan tunes, a musical cartoon attempts to describe the character of the British nation, with occasional interruptions by Prince Charles.

A short animated War Office commissioned health education film, showing the fate of each of the 6 jungle soldiers.

Examines in detail Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s painting, 'Netherlandish Proverbs', which illustrates over 100 proverbs and allegorises a whole world of sin and folly as relevant today as in the 16th century.

A dancing radio stops partying to transmit an announcement on fuel conservation in this WWII cartoon short.

A BAFTA award nominated animation looking at the development of oil prospecting techniques since the 19th century.

An animated visual interpretation of the song "Autobahn," by German electronic pioneers Kraftwerk. A fast-paced experimental film which proved to be a groundbreaking combination of electronic and manual animation. One of the first films produced specifically for video disk.

A lonely man living in a large city buys a life-size sex doll. His relationship with his dream doll causes a certain reaction in the community. A bizarre adaption of Le Ballon Rouge.

Hamilton the elephant is being trained for the circus when he discovers his amazing musical ability; the ringmaster decides to exploit his new-found talent for jazz.

A poem of unrequited love: the studio's first puppet production. Based on a poem by Cosbie Garstin, the film tells the story of a carved wooden saint who is painted to look like a soldier and used as a figurehead on a sailing ship. The ship sinks and the figurehead is saved by a beautiful mermaid who falls in love with him. Her love is not returned because despite his dashing looks he has the wooden heart of a saint.

The film is designed to encourage recycling - which was a key part of the war effort.

Meet Charley, your jovial cartoon guide to Britain’s changing towns and cities.

The Shorts and the Talls just can’t see eye to eye until a mediating fairy arrives to help them make ends meet.

This a story of a violinist, pianist and cellist as they perform from place-to-place, under very unusual conditions. Every time they play, they remind someone of a lost love, so they are hired immediately hired by nightclub owners, ship captains and even a pirate... wherever circumstances take them.

Our animated hero questions his sanity after blowing his top and driving his car into a police station.