Silver Lining

1947
Sound
2m

Bread today and jam tomorrow? Cheerful puppet cartoon with a catchy song sweetens the pill of postwar austerity.

Storm clouds may gather but every cloud has a silver lining, or so they say. This jolly postwar animated puppet film for National Savings was made to persuade the public of the benefits of investing in government bonds rather than splashing their hard-earned cash. With rationing and austerity still a feature of late-1940s life, there was little enthusiasm for further scrimping and self-denial. However, the cartoon's upbeat imagery and promise of sunnier days ahead makes a noble attempt at dispelling the gloom.

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.

Animated Ads

British animation won great success as an entertainer, but it has long had a lucrative second career in sales

In cinemas and on TV, animated adverts have frequently outshone the main attraction. In the early days of the cinema, animated ads were often relative epics, with five-minute comic encounters leading to a pack-shot punchline. The arrival of commercial television in 1955 brought the animated ad down to bite-size, but if anything they packed an even harder punch. Advertisers found that animation could soften the edges of a hard sell approach, and bring cartoon brand characters to life.