Dear comrade Obama Claus, I'm all alone in the world this Christmas because capitalists killed my family. Is there really a People's Cube? The Red Balloon is one of the most instructional children's films. In this deceptively simple, nearly wordless tale, a poor young girl discovers a stray balloon on Christmas morning that seems to have a mind of its own. The two become inseparable and spend the day killing all the enemies of the state and by evening they are celebrated as people's heroes by comrade Obama at the People's christmas feast. A beautiful Cinderella story for our times.

Comrade Margaret, I had not before heard this glorious story of the People's Red Balloon! Thank you so much for posting it here - I'm sure it will drift into and out of my thoughts (somewhat like a balloon adrift on the wind, but not) until Christmas Marxmas has come and gone. Even now, as I wistfully contemplate the story, it brings a tear of sadness to my right eye and a tear of joy to my left, which, if I twist my head back and forth rapidly at the precise moments that they run, respectfully, down my right and left cheeks, will co-mingle into a progressive tear of harmonious wonder somewhere between my nose and my chin.

Thank you, Margaret. And may all the FORWARD! (but fully equal) joy of the season be yours (and equally the kollektive's) this Marxmas!

Margaret wrote:Dear comrade Obama Claus, I'm all alone in the world this Christmas because capitalists killed all my family.

I bet they worked them to death. Had they joined a union this would never have happened.

Ah but Comrades, Marxmas is about MORE than just killing the enemies of the state in the name of peace! It is about taking back what the capitalist pigs have plundered and re-distributing it back to the people! I hope that the Party Literary Control Commission, in the name of Free Speech and Creativity, will mandate some changes to the Red Balloon Tale, such as having it return to the little womyn-person with the bounty of the People's latest Five Year Plan.

I remember many such joyous Marxmas celebrations in the USSR - my parents stood on line for hours at the store, only to find when they got inside that the shelves were empty. There was NOTHING, but the thing is, there was plenty of it for EVERYONE and EVERYONE except the Party insiders got the SAME NOTHING! [sniff, sniff] Glorious!

Opiate of the People wrote:Ah but Comrades, Marxmas is about MORE than just killing the enemies of the state in the name of peace! It is about taking back what the capitalist pigs have plundered and re-distributing it back to the people!

Couldn't've said it better, Comrade Opiate. (So I let my avatar say it for me.)

Choir Director Margaret, a full decade later, and The Red Balloon continues as artistic achievement.

Forelock tug to all the above expressions of praise.