Robinson Charley

1948
Sound
10m

No man is an island, but Charley represents his nation in this economical cartoon tale of Britain's economics

Meet Charley, the portrait of a nation. At the end of the 1940s the Central Office of Information commissioned Halas & Batchelor to make seven films about policies of the post-war Labour Government. Charley was cast as the figurehead of the campaign, learning about mining, farming, national insurance, and even schooling via a son at the end of the series. This episode looks at the Marshall Plan, and makes the most explicit link between character and country as his life story stands in for 270 years of British economic history.

This government film is a public record, preserved and presented by the BFI National Archive on behalf of The National Archives, home to more than 1,000 years of British history.

Animation Goes to Work

For those with an official message to get across, animation is the perfect messenger

Animation has an almost magical ability to charm and captivate. And those same qualities also make it a strikingly effective communication tool. It grabs attention, speaks to all ages, and can distil complex messages into simple and appealing visual metaphors. For government or other august bodies, cartoon antics have often been the perfect jam to sweeten the pill of official communications, whether to explain sweeping change or impart health and safety messages. And for the inventive animator, even the most utilitarian brief is no barrier to the most outlandish of treatments.