Horton Hears a Who! (1970)

Animated / Family
1970 / 30 minutes
Rating: 7/10

Based on the Dr. Seuss classic picture book of the same name, this is the story of what a caring elephant heard, and what he did. With ears as big as his heart, Horton the elephant heard what no one else could – he heard the cry of some microscopically tiny people crying out for help.

It seems there was an entire town of tiny persons – Whos is their name – living on a small speck of dust.  And with the wind blowing their speck about, a cry went out for assistance… and Horton came to their rescue. Why? Well, because, as Horton notes, “a person’s a person, no matter how small!” He cushioned their fall, putting their speck on a clover fluff.

While Dr. Seuss was not pro-life – at least according to his second wife – his story most decidedly is. Horton knows what others in the jungle do not: that size doesn’t make the person. No one else believes that anything that tiny could have life on it, so they try to lock up Horton, and, in a vindictive twist, they try to boil the clover! But it doesn’t matter what they all believe – it only matters what’s so, and so, Horton fights on, while begging the tiny Whos to make themselves heard. Will their personhood be recognized? Will the murderous mob be turned?

We can only hope so, because, as is true of the unborn, and Whovians alike, “a person is a person no matter how small.”

There is a 2008, full-length feature film version that might also be worth checking out, but I have yet to see it. You can watch the trailer for this half-hour version below.