Letters to the Editor

The ultimate family DVD list We asked; you answered. Here's the most-awesome-ever summertime list of offbeat, kid-friendly movies available on DVD -- as chosen (mostly) by Salon readers. Andrew O'Hehir [2008-07-12]

• What makes a film child-friendly?

  On looking again at this thread, I find myself wondering about what precisely makes a film "kid-friendly." After taking my four-year-old cousin to see KUNG FU PANDA (her choice, not mine), I can state with certainty that the film was not appropriate for her, or for any other children in the theater. It's not that the film was objectionable as such -- it simply bored the kids to distraction. There's no reason to pay attention to a bunch of plush toys who knock the stuffing out of each other. (Yes, the film's homage to chop-socky cinema is clever, but how does one explain this to a kid?)

  So ... what makes a film "kid-friendly," and for which kids? It's easier to start with negative examples, I suppose. I'm inclined to rule against fare like THE IRON GIANT, simply because I find it a touch morbid for the sippy-cup set. I suppose tweens won't have a problem with it, though the forced 1950s nostalgia appeals more to parents than to their offspring, and the whole movie comes with a slight aftertaste of spinach. I'm not sure children respond well to an elegiac tone, the sort of thing one finds throughout Gilliam's BARON MUNCHAUSEN (and finds to an even greater degree in the 1943 Nazi production MUNCHHAUSEN) -- but if Gilliam's film is too pessimistic for children, then who precisely is its audience? The same question holds for the Hulot films, which seem more genially nostalgic, and have a certain Gallic detachment that I'm not sure children would entirely comprehend.

  -- timothyhulsey
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