Summer Movies
I have been to two movies in the theater in the past two weeks (foreseen and intended side effect of living two blocks from the theater). SPOILERS AHEAD
The first was Toy Story 3, the last installment in the beloved Disney Pixar animated saga. I know this is going to be heresy, but I didn’t like it very much–it was too frightening. There was an evil “boss” of the day care who initially appeared avuncular and kind to the protagonist toys, but who was the model of unredeemed evil. (Even after the toys save his life, he betrays them.) And at one point, all the toys hold hands, as they contemplate what seems to be certain, gruesome death by fire. The seven-year-old with me was fine–she said, “Don’t worry–it’s just pretend!” But of course, it’s not–it’s all too real, for too many people. It should be rated G for kids, and R for adults. Somehow, it’s more frightening because it’s done with toys.
The other was Knight and Day–the Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz movie about a Boston old car restorer on her way to her sister’s wedding who gets mixed up with a secret agent. Now that was “just pretend” in all the right ways for a summer flick. Witty dialogue, romance, fantastical car chases, no gruesomeness, and bad guys that get theirs in the end. Plus great shots of Boston and the Pacific Coast and Salzburg.
Yes — I do know that my reaction is exactly the opposite of pretty much every one else to both films.
Toys have an incredibly powerful hold on kids’ imagination, and they seem to identify with harm or rejection of toys.
I showed my son the Shirley Temple “Heidi” when he was about 4. He started sobbing when Fraulein Rottenmeier broke Heidi’s glass paperweight. I had to turn the movie off.
He also freaked out over “Toy Story I,” where Sid mutilates his toys. He held on to toys he’d long outgrown simply because he couldn’t bear to see them on the trash heap.
These anxieties and concerns were later transferred to his cat Geoffrey, and, finally, when he was about 7 or 8 to real people.
I read the review on America’s “In All Things” before seeing Toy Story 3, and I have to agree with that opinion: there is a pro-torture undercurrent. When you want to extract information from someone who is unwilling to give it to you, it is expected that you will inflict physical or mental pain on that person to force him to reveal the information. Bad when it’s done by bad guys, good when it’s done by good guys, but not bad in and of itself – at least, inflicting mental pain seems to be condoned.
I thoroughly enjoyed “Knight and Day”, I think that the critics missed the point completely–this is a film in the grand tradition of all those wonderful ones of the past, perhaps with Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn fleeing spies and crooks through lavishly photographed foreign locations. The violence was not particularly gruesome and the sex was not explicit. This movie is a great way to spend a hot summer afternoon!