what I've been doing lately and I really don't want to be judged for this is watching old soviet
cartoons the soviets were never known for their art but their animations were genuinely incredible
like augur television it made heavy use of propaganda either pro-soviet or anti-western
and it was never subtle but as you'll see in this video the propaganda often has the opposite effect
welcome to the ridiculous world of soviet cartoons
one of the most influential soviet cartoons is called The millionaire it tells the story
of a wealthy heiress who sadly dies young and when I say young she was around 70 years old
so anyway this old hag dies and she leaves her entire fortune to her pet dog
even in the world of a 1960s cartoon this was highly unusual apparently dreading the prospect
of a dog client the lawyers did all they could to annul her will but thankfully they were unable to
do so and the bulldog became rich overnight here's where it starts to get less realistic
he began walking upright and wore nice suits he went out to clubs and danced with women coming
home drunk every night at one point he goes into business becoming a powerful banker but for a
dog like him nothing was ever good enough so he went into politics and was elected to congress
and that's where the story ends having depicted his rise from dog to dog man to congressman
the point of all this was clearly to make the west look bad but what it really does
is make the west look amazing I would much rather this cartoon be reality
I don't want to live in a world where dogs can't become billionaires or be elected
lawmakers that's what I believe in it's what my father believed in and his father before him
in a sense the millionaire is the soviet response to animal farm
its main character clearly representing those who inherit vast wealth at one point he even ignores
other dogs who were once his friends which is by far the most depressing thing ever shown on film
stylistically it is typical of soviet propaganda films of the 1960s
being crude and bleak at for time soviet artists were discouraged from being abstract
the soviet leader even condemned abstract artists western as a result the arts produced
here was really very incredibly bad and it's amazing that in this environment they
were able to create such a bizarre cartoon so I thought I'd upload it here for you all to enjoy