Are cartoons just for kids?

by Jenny Purt

Adult messages in children’s films are no new thing. Look back to the 1942 Disney animated movie Bambi and in amongst the fluffy rabbits and dancing deer, you will find an intense observation of the loss nature suffers as a result of human recklessness.

Many of these movies have more depth than the simple narrative young viewers experience, aimed at their grown-up counterparts, particularly parents. Children’s films often advocate co-existence between humans and nature, as well as peppering dialogue with grown-up references and innuendos, while effortlessly transfixing the children in the audience.       

So how do children’s films convey these more profound messages? If you are accompanying a younger brother or sister to the cinema to watch a film about a talking dog trying to save the world, you may well be surprised when the child's play narrative addresses more serious issues.

Sometimes these messages are subtle, but other times they scream out. In the past these have included sexual innuendos, political references and digs at tolerance within society.           

An animated society                      

A modern-day example of a children’s film that deals with adult issues is Finding Nemo. When baby fish Nemo swims off to school, it is the first time his over-protective single-parent father has let him out of his sight. With a burning desire to explore, Nemo ends up whisked off in a fisherman’s net with no preparation for life outside his comfortable bubble.

To a child, the film is merely an under-sea adventure, but to adults a deeper theme, so to speak, can be seen. Finding Nemo deals with the problems that arise from wrapping your child up in cotton wool and, using the fish world as a metaphor, looks at how this has negative effects once they do have to experience the world.

Another issue Finding Nemo addresses is that of disability. Nemo has a deformed fin from birth and this perhaps adds to his father’s over-protectiveness.

Happy Feet, released by Warner Brothers in 2006, also has a similar theme with the main character, being a penguin called Mumble who suffers from a range of disabilities. His mum and dad come under the scrutiny of the other parents and teachers who don’t give Mumble a chance, but with their support, the young penguin succeeds in what he is best at: dance.

The film promotes the idea that, even if your child is not stereotypically ‘normal’, they will still have a lot to offer and the way a parent deals with this is cruicial.  

Another recent movie falling into this category is Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs by Sony Pictures Animation. It was described by Channel 4 film’s Catherine Bray: “Animation and comedy have always been a good way of slipping in broadsides at social norms without looking like a preachy so-and-so, and there’s more criticism of global warming, sexism in the media, obesity issues and capitalism in this one film than many an earnest documentary - but only if you care to look for it.”                  

For a more cultural slant, let’s not forget DreamWorks’ Bee Movie, which deals with an oft-ignored topic in cartoons, that of race. The bee parents in the movie worry that their bee teens will end up dating wasps – a big no-no – and there is also the mosquito on the windscreen, who poignantly refers to his mosquito brethren as “Bloods”.

Along with this, the recreation of the toppling of Saddam Hussein’s statue in Baghdad – with a teddy bear-shaped honey pot – makes it difficult for any adult to miss the point the filmmaker is trying to make.               

With this in mind, can we read more into the old Disney films we used to know and love?

Modern cartoons

A study, conducted by film and animation expert Dr David Whitley from the University of Cambridge, suggests that there is more than the pure populism and escapism than meets the eye: “Disney films have often been criticised as inauthentic and pandering to popular taste, rather than developing the animation medium in a more thought-provoking way. In fact, these films have taught us variously about having a fundamental respect for nature.”

He concludes by saying that: “Popular art often does more than we think to shape our feelings and our ideas about certain themes. Disney may well be telling us more about the environment and the way we relate to it than we tend to accept.”

However, whatever noble messages conveyed by Disney, or its sibling, animation giant Pixar (alongside all the other big names in animation), they are most likely – like any other multimillion-dollar corporation – in the business of making money first, and educating second.

 

Although adult messages have always existed in children’s movies, what we now see is a new trend in the ideas that are being conveyed.

Like every art medium, these messages are constantly evolving, and deal with the issues that are current to the respective time. What becomes apparent is the cyclic pattern in which the same issues appear and reappear. For example, Shrek is a modern version of Beauty and the Beast, Chicken Run is suspiciously reminiscent of The Great Escape, and who ever made the link between The Lion King and Shakespeare, as it – essentially – is Hamlet with fur.

It seems that as an adult, the place to observe and enjoy life’s moral lessons may not be through religion or devoting your spare time to charity, but indeed through watching children’s films.