Yesterday the kids went to see the new movie, Megamind. R went to a birthday party at the theatre, so we decided to take L and a friend as well. L had a couple of gift certificates that he was given last year for his birthday, so he got to pick a friend to take, as it was free!
Now, after seeing and loving many of Dreamworks animated movies, I was looking forward to seeing this and quite frankly I expected big laughs from this movie.
And it was entertaining. A good way to pass the afternoon, but it wasn't...great. I laughed way harder at Shrek, Madagascar and Monsters vs. Aliens. Most of the funny parts are in the trailers, but I did give a little chuckle here and there. It got pretty slow during the middle too, almost as if they didn't know where to take the film next.
The part that totally turned me off though was this:
The villain is holding the heroine hostage on top of a building. She looks at him and tells him that he doesn't need to do this, that she just knows there is good in him (yeah that line's been overdone). He scoffs and says that is her problem, always seeing the good in people even when it isn't there, that she is naive and trusting. He then goes on to say (and I'm quoting only from memory here, but it's pretty close I believe), "Well I've got news for you! There is no Tooth Fairy, no Easter Bunny and no Queen of England!"
At that point I stopped watching and listening to glance around me horrified. Thankfully the kids didn't seem phased. I turned to DH and whispered that I couldn't believe they just said that!
I suppose in retrospect that in saying that there is no Queen of England made the whole statement a lie, or at least maybe that's what they were hoping the kids would think. But many of the kids that are seeing this film are at that age where they are on the cusp of still believing and not too sure if it's all true. Being so close to Xmas, thank God they didn't mention Santa Claus! I would think a statement like that could possibly put the question of "Is there? Or isn't there?" into their minds if it never occurred to them to question it before. And some kids were very young, like 3 or 4, so how would they understand the joke? All they would hear would be "there is no..."and wouldn't even know anything about the queen of England. I'm not going to get into a debate here about the issue of taking such a young child to a PG movie, as every family and child is different. Some can handle it, some can't and hopefully the parents recognize that. But I can see why they would take them. Dreamworks has put out many great movies such as Shrek and Madagascar, movies I would have let my 4 year old watch. So they have set a precedent with these films, and we trust in that filmmaker not to disappoint or lead us astray. I wouldn't have thought twice about taking my 4 year old, had I had one, after all, I didn't give a second though to taking two six year olds. They do give the film a PG rating, but everything is marketed to the younger set! Why do they confuse us this way? And why oh why would you go ahead and blurt out in the middle of a kids' movie that there is no tooth fairy or Easter bunny?!?!?!!
I still don't know R's take on it all as it's one of those things that you can't really bring up without giving yourself away. I'm hoping that if he wants to discuss it, he will, and out of earshot of his younger brother.
But parents be warned! You may want to take your younger ones out to the bathroom when you see the heroine get flown up to the top of the tower near the end.
I couldn't agree more with you. It was absolutely unnecessary for them to say this line. I had the EXACT same reaction as you did. I completely stopped paying attention to the movie, and began wathing for a reaction. They could have gotten across the exact same message without saying that. This movie is not only a cartoon, but portrayed as a childrens movie. As such, this line was completely inappropriate.
ReplyDeleteI actually emailed Dreamworks to tell them how disgusted I was that they would even consider using this line.