Doing Their Bit is a good companion to the new DVD Walt Disney Treasures: On the Front Lines.

The filmography for this book is useful for other reasons. Credits for each film are given when known. While some studios like Terrytoons never bothered to recognize their artists with credits, the authors provide sometimes hard to find credits for other studios including Columbia, Universal, Disney, Paramount (but not the George Pal films) MGM and Warner Bros.

They also include a few quotes from the Office of War Information about specific works. The comment about Superman in The Eleventh Hour, 1942, by an OWI analyst fascinates me, as it doesn't make sense. It reads, "It seems to me to have a bad influence. The Japs are not beaten by a mythical Superman, but by the men of the United Nations." Was there something wrong suggesting our allied forces could be victorious?

Another nice feature is having lines in italics after the discussion of each cartoon. They serve as a quick reference guide to the works' content. They begin with a code that indicates whether it barely hints at the world crisis (like Dumbo) or if it is hard hitting propaganda like Disney's brilliant Education for Death, 1943. The latter explains some of the things wrong with the way of life in Nazi Germany. The lines in italics also list the themes/topics depicted in the films.

If you have read this far you probably will enjoy adding this book to your library. It makes reading about these historic works exciting. The book is a good companion to the new DVD Walt Disney Treasures: On the Front Lines.

Doing Their Bit: Wartime American Animated Short Films (1939-1945) by Michael S. Shull and David E. Wilt, McFarland, 2nd edition (soft cover, 246 pages, illustrated, $38.50 or $42.50 postpaid from the publisher, PO Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640 (800) 253-2187 www.mcfarlandpub.com

Karl Cohen teaches animation history at San Francisco State (Dylan Brown was one of his students), is the author of Forbidden Animation: Censored Cartoons and Blacklisted Animators (McFarland, 1997), is president of ASIFA-SF and is a frequent contributor to Animation World Magazine. In 1984, he directed, shot, edited and did the effects for an anti-nuke film Speak Up! Uncle Sam is Hard of Hearing. This short includes an animated/special effects sequence and is distributed by Canyon Cinema.