(Cr)happy Feet

I dislike most CGI movies - let's say a good 90% of them. If an animated film isn't visually pleasing to my eye, let alone 90 minutes of it, I'm not gonna pay $8.50 and sit in a theatre full of noisy 5-year-olds, wincing at screams AND poor 3-D animation.


Which brings me to this point - I have no intention on seeing Happy Feet. It looks like one long Coca-Cola commercial to me. Plus, penguins aren't built for tap dancing. But what I really find disturbing is that Happy Feet apparently includes underlying environmental propaganda aimed at children. I also watched a clip on TV the other night where one of the penguins (I think Robin Williams' character) had a plastic six-pack ring stuck around his neck. And I've heard about the 'aliens' in the movie, which are actually us, the humans!!! COME ON NOW. I'm all for recycling, going green, conservation, protecting our endangered animals (I clip six-pack rings before I throw them away, and you should too), blah blah blah, etc. I've tried to do my part over the years. Like many of you, I love animals and I don't love pollution. BUT DON'T THROW THAT ENVIRONMENTAL CRAP INTO A MOVIE! If you want your kids to learn about that kind of stuff, tune them in to Animal Planet or take them to the zoo. But PLEASE, don't make them watch reruns of Captain Planet. There are better ways to learn about the environment than to expose your children to DiC cartoons.

Obviously it would benefit your child to learn about the dangers of man's destruction and its effects on Earth. We should be responsible and proactive in preserving our planet. But a G-rated family movie just isn't the place to be shoving this kind of stuff down a kid's throat, that's all.

You know, it'd make even better sense to keep the propaganda OUT of the films, and license these characters to organizations such as the WWF or AZA. Use them in promotional materials and educational films that are AIMED at such awarenesses. Kids would recognize the characters from the popular movie and immediately take interest. It's been done before, right?

So in conclusion, don't see Happy Feet unless you have bad taste in animation AND loved the Al Gore movie.