Animation and the War Saving Certificate: British Propaganda Films Produced for the Home Front during the First World War

Abstract

The War Cabinet founded the National War Aims Committee, an organization formed in August 1917, in order to create British propaganda for the home front during the last stages of the First World War. The committee was involved in cinema in two ways. One of them was outdoor film showing activity handled by its Meeting Department, and the other was producing films cooperating with other official organizations and film companies. The Kincartoons Series produced by the committee and the Kinsella & Morgan Film Company were highly entertaining films revolving around patriotic themes, including how to buy the War Savings Certificates and the promising future that will come in return.

The purpose of this article is to describe similarities of ideological structures between verbal messages presented at the Committee’s meetings and the Kincartoons Series. After examining the series’ morale-boosting narratives and characters that were common to all works, it was clear that the ideological structures shown to cinema audiences were similar to the patriotic themes included in speeches or printed materials. The verbal messages were transformed from words by using visual components and mixed forms of animation style, which made the messages apprehensible to people of all generations.