The Butter Battle Book

Butter Battle is an entertaining story about two fictional cities and their arms race. It is also as misguided allegory about the Cold-War and arms races in general. Yes, it is a children's book, but like so many of Theodor Seuss Geisel's works it hits people over the head with its moral.

And that moral is what, exactly? Sure it is laudable to encourage us to concentrate more on what unites us than what divides us. It is even a good thing to encourage international cooperation. But to equate the differences between the Warsaw Pact nations and the Nato west to a difference in butter application is just plain wrong. To point out the obvious, many Warsaw Pact nations enjoyed intermittent periods of shortages of butter and bread -- they would have been happy to eat it butter sideways if it were available. On a less literal level, and whatever your political inclination, Soviet socialism versus Western (particularly Anglo-American) democracy is not a mere question of preference and custom.

To make the point even clearer, nuclear weapons were not developed in a Cold War with the Soviets, but in a hot war with the Axis powers. There is no doubt that Germany was developing nuclear capability during the war. Should the US have refrained from nuclear weapons research putting their trust in their (less than inevitable) victory in the conventional war? Once the weapons were developed they were used against the enemy who attacked us at Pearl Harbor. What does a nation do at this point when the genie is out of the bottle? Furthermore, hindsight is 20-20, which is to say that there was no way of assuring another half crazed dictator wouldn't crop up with his eyes on developing nuclear weapons. The second Gulf War has shown the incredible difficulty in ascertaining credible threats and neutralizing them.

In any event, the cartoon is little more than simplistic propaganda which does little to explore the nuances of the ethical questions behind nuclear armament and instead tries to inculcate fear of weapons technology into children.

The Butter Battle Book was a controversial children's book for its time. Written and published during the Cold War, it was a parable about the arms race, and taught a heavy lesson. The book came out in 1984, and in 1989, the book was adapted into a television special.

So, in case you never read the book (or you are one of those people who hate reading books in particular), here's the story: The Yooks and Zooks live on two opposing sides of a wall, as they are divided based on one thing: A disagreement over how to eat bread. The Yooks eat it butter-side up while the Zooks eat it butter-side down. However, it does not take long for a Zook to torment Grandpa (voiced by Charles Durning) with a slingshot, which triggers an arms race.

This TV special is praised by Dr. Seuss as the most faithful adaptation of his works, and watching it, I have to agree. The TV special follows the book closely. The voice actors do a good job voicing the characters, and the animation is vibrant. Also, the songs put in are catchy, and fit with the show. This is one I recommend showing to your kids, as it is a good lesson on how easy it is for two sides to escalate into a war, even one that could spell the end the of the human race.

Wow. Wow, wow. Hmmm. Do I waste the words? In the spirit of Bakshi, I'll stay human and fail by trying. I won't believe the Grandfather. Anyone who studies Bakshi feels the tides of generations, of change, of the street, of music, and art, addiction and emotion. Of the loss of soul which accompanies conviction. So those few will suck on the sour, ironic pill of these comments like they have every minute of Bakshi film, and twist their face wry, and spit it out and never forget. They illustrate alike. Let me simplify and close; from 'a brilliant, if all-too-brief, collaboration...' "Soon there are goofy attempts by a hired Grandfather Yook (voiced by Charles Durning) to take on the task of stopping the Zooks from continuing on their bottom-buttered path." And contrast. From 'Simplistic and misguided' "In any event, the cartoon is little more than simplistic propaganda which does little to explore the nuances of the ethical questions behind nuclear armament and instead tries to inculcate fear of weapons technology into children." Do I really need to summarize? Probably, but I won't. Conviction becomes reality. What acts is indestructible.

Who would've thought that one of the very best adaptations from book to screen- albeit small screen- in the Dr. Seuss realm would be by underground animated filmmaker Ralph Bakshi. By then, Bakshi had gone on from the more personal work of the 70s, trademarked with rough pencil and inking with wild color combos in unconventional stories, to more sci-fi/fantasy fare like Wizards, Fire and Ice, and even a hit and miss attempt at Lord of the Rings. This short work that he produced and directed, probably as a way to make ends meet as much as an artistic statement, is probably one of his most obscure works, but it might be one of his better works because he keeps his ambitions low and his targets simple enough to accomplish completely. What we have here is a story that has a level of appeal for children and adults, and like the recent Happy Feet it will mean different things for different audiences. For either age group, child or parent (or those who are out to seek any and all works by Bakshi), there's some appeal.

For kids, it's a bright story of what it means to have a job to do, however petty or ridiculous it might seem. The Yooks and the Zooks are two different kinds of, well, Seuss characters, who each have their own way of spreading butter on bread, one side up, the other side down. Soon there are goofy attempts by a hired Grandfather Yook (voiced by Charles Durning) to take on the task of stopping the Zooks from continuing on their bottom-buttered path. There are also some whimsical songs, and even some random moments of strange humor, as can only come out of Seuss. But for the older ones, those who might have any kind of political awareness, Seuss and Bakshi have a simple message to go on, which is the notion of wars being started on the most petty but fastidiously held points of merit. And, as escalating tactics go, pretty soon it's less about the actual butter itself than the point of one side being too different enough- separated by a 'great-wall' kind of wall barrier- to ever have any kind of peace. There's details like how grandfather, however incompetent he might be to swart the Zooks, gets promoted to general, or how intricate a bomb can be made: and how it's just as easy for the other side to get the same power.

It's not only how sharply and aptly Bakshi is in having Seuss's words have their impact, and the wit as scathing as it is poke-in-the-ribs playful and fairly hilarious (I loved the ending, which I won't reveal, but has its suddenness as a point of absurdity and satirical merit), but in fusing in his own methods of style that make this a success. Bakshi, taking a break from rotoscoping, makes the Seuss cartoonish world come to life, and in a manner that presents it not totally smooth and finely tuned but a little scratchy and messy and with the colors usually of the lighter-primary side (the exception, and a great scene at that, is when grandfather ventures down the staircase to the bomb-making lava-pool area). There's something very much alive to how Baskhi gets the Yoots and Zoots moving along, how they use oddball weaponry or machines, and how the timing is less out of Looney Tunes than out of his background as a satirist of culture. He even gets Seuss's songs, which are by turns silly and inane, as entertaining little notes in the story.

If you can find this for your kids, if they happen to be Dr. Seuss fans anyway, it's a sure bet to get them into a lesser known but still worthwhile work. It's smart, vibrant, and almost cheerfully discomforting; second only to Chuck Jones's How the Grinch Stole Christmas as the best animated adaptation of a Seuss work. 8.5/10

Even from an early age I have loved Dr Seuss, and I find the animated versions of his work on the most part classics(1966's How the Grinch Stole Christmas is my favourite). Ralph Bakshi's The Butter Battle Book is not an exception. While I am more familiar with and prefer Chuck Jones' visual style, the animation is very good, not always smooth but always colourful and vibrant. The score has the right mix of whimsy and energy, while the songs are very catchy and succeed in making Dr Seuss' classic rhymes highly memorable. With or without song, the rhymes have razor-sharp bite and wit and move along at a sprightly(and gentle when needed) pace. The story is simple, smart, charming and true to Dr Seuss' book, with many funny moments for children and adults to savour. The message is important and doesn't feel thankfully overly-didactic in how it was put across. The characters are wholly engaging and the voice acting I can't fault either. All in all, terrific like most of the Dr Seuss animated adaptations. 10/10 Bethany Cox