Apparently the author didn’t actually watch the movie carefully.
Arendelle was already evacuated. No people were in danger from the tidal wave. Elsa was just saving the city from physical destruction.
I think you can also make a converse argument to the author very easily: death and disaster are common, almost universal, so avoiding discussing them in children’s media is over-protective.
In any event, I think there’s a point being missed here: the ratings system is a self-regulatory measure and mostly represents a way to classify films as the culture as a whole views profanity. In that respect, they have shifted over time as the definition of “acceptable” has shifted over time.
The author is really just lamenting the fact that their views don’t line up with the majority of Western society.
And that’s perfectly okay because the MPAA rating system is just one voluntary rating system of many. Parents are free to entirely ignore it, or they can reference the information rating systems from other countries, or third parties like common sense media.
As an analogy, the author could be upset if they were from a majority Muslim country and then decided to visit a nude beach in France. They might be upset about public display of nudity in that context. But they are in France and that is what is culturally acceptable in France in that specific public space.
Oh my, I saw half of these movies as a kid and all of them left scars on my soul. Watching Poltergeist as a kid is like watching Event Horizon as an adult (I recommend watching Event Horizon though).
An example of modern ratings being oddly strict: Öoo is rated T by the ESRB[1]. It’s laughable that a nonviolent puzzle platformer about a caterpillar is less age appropriate than Breath of the Wild, which is rated E10+[2] despite also having bombs and a lot more violence.
If Öoo is rated T, should games staring Donald Duck be rated 18+ because he doesn’t wear pants and would be showing his crotch to children?
Ground your LLM searches and actually look through the script or at least an overview or something. Don’t rely on it being in training data, it undermines your entire discussion
Some might quibble with using AI for research, but this at least feels directionally correct. I'm not sure if ratings/MPAA is the right avenue to fix it, but the sheer laziness of manufacturing stakes by catastrophe instead of through characters definitely feels like its gotten worse.
Lazy storytelling is perhaps the issue here. Of course, I can reward or punish lazy storytelling by which media I choose to buy or skip.
I think it’s worth pointing out that the MPAA is just a voluntary private ratings board. If they want to say violence is less serious than sex that’s their prerogative. I don’t have to agree with it.
I was horrified by the literal waterboarding scene in Shrek. Granted it was a year or two before the USA started trying to normalise that form of torture. I don’t know what was in the popular consciousness in the US at the time. But it’s very spooky.
Children’s fiction has always had a very dark side though.
There is no 'literal waterboarding scene' in the theatrically released Shrek. In the scene you've seen, unless you're deep into dubious fan-remakes, Gingy 'just' gets dipped in milk (mostly off-screen) by an executioner-style heavy, then Lord Farquaad taunts them with their torn-off legs, which suggests legs-first dipping, not the head-first submersion that is the entire point of waterboarding.
Still pretty bad (even though the gingerbread buttons were apparently spared), but... not literal, and not even figurative, waterboarding.
At the opening of the scene, the gingerbread man is being drowned in milk. You see from the shadow, and the voice, that he's having his head submerged in liquid. then Lord Farquaad says "enough! he's ready to talk". So that's simulated drowning as part of interrogation to get information.
Nit-picking about the exact _orientation_ of the victim, and therefore what type of simulated-drowning torture this constitutes, is somewhat missing the point I was trying to make! i.e. that torture is normalised to the point of being slapstick in a children's film.
Yeah, I think the “adult media disguised as kids media” has been a thing for a long time.
But I also think that a lot of teen and preteen media has very little functional distinction from adult media.
A lot of non-parents don’t realize that the difference between G and PG can be huge. Shrek sounds like it should be something for a 3 year old but it really isn’t. Even without the torture scene it’s immediacy really scary. You have to go with something a lot more gentle than that for young kids.
I think the torture scene is funny to an adult as a mockery of the zeitgeist if you decide to interpret it that way. After all, Farquad is intended to be a villain.
It's been dark since the Grimms, and likely long before!
I just rewatched it (link in sibling link). It's mocking Farquaad, but I think is clearly meant to be taken as slapstick. Implying that torture is no big deal.
Apparently the author didn’t actually watch the movie carefully.
Arendelle was already evacuated. No people were in danger from the tidal wave. Elsa was just saving the city from physical destruction.
I think you can also make a converse argument to the author very easily: death and disaster are common, almost universal, so avoiding discussing them in children’s media is over-protective.
In any event, I think there’s a point being missed here: the ratings system is a self-regulatory measure and mostly represents a way to classify films as the culture as a whole views profanity. In that respect, they have shifted over time as the definition of “acceptable” has shifted over time.
The author is really just lamenting the fact that their views don’t line up with the majority of Western society.
And that’s perfectly okay because the MPAA rating system is just one voluntary rating system of many. Parents are free to entirely ignore it, or they can reference the information rating systems from other countries, or third parties like common sense media.
As an analogy, the author could be upset if they were from a majority Muslim country and then decided to visit a nude beach in France. They might be upset about public display of nudity in that context. But they are in France and that is what is culturally acceptable in France in that specific public space.
Looking at what movies got away with in the 80s while retaining a rating of "PG" definitely shows we're sliding on what we call acceptable.
There are numerous lists online that can be found with a search, but here's one by an IMDB user: https://www.imdb.com/list/ls020284330/
You could get away with some stuff in the 80s and keep PG.
Oh my, I saw half of these movies as a kid and all of them left scars on my soul. Watching Poltergeist as a kid is like watching Event Horizon as an adult (I recommend watching Event Horizon though).
David Lynch's "Elephant Man" was considered a good kids' movie for my 5th-grade class.
Put it this way: My dad used to beat me, and that was less traumatic than that movie.
An example of modern ratings being oddly strict: Öoo is rated T by the ESRB[1]. It’s laughable that a nonviolent puzzle platformer about a caterpillar is less age appropriate than Breath of the Wild, which is rated E10+[2] despite also having bombs and a lot more violence.
If Öoo is rated T, should games staring Donald Duck be rated 18+ because he doesn’t wear pants and would be showing his crotch to children?
[1]: https://www.nintendo.com/en-ca/store/products/ooo-switch/
[2]: https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/the-legend-of-zel...
Ground your LLM searches and actually look through the script or at least an overview or something. Don’t rely on it being in training data, it undermines your entire discussion
Some might quibble with using AI for research, but this at least feels directionally correct. I'm not sure if ratings/MPAA is the right avenue to fix it, but the sheer laziness of manufacturing stakes by catastrophe instead of through characters definitely feels like its gotten worse.
Lazy storytelling is perhaps the issue here. Of course, I can reward or punish lazy storytelling by which media I choose to buy or skip.
I think it’s worth pointing out that the MPAA is just a voluntary private ratings board. If they want to say violence is less serious than sex that’s their prerogative. I don’t have to agree with it.
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I was horrified by the literal waterboarding scene in Shrek. Granted it was a year or two before the USA started trying to normalise that form of torture. I don’t know what was in the popular consciousness in the US at the time. But it’s very spooky.
Children’s fiction has always had a very dark side though.
There is no 'literal waterboarding scene' in the theatrically released Shrek. In the scene you've seen, unless you're deep into dubious fan-remakes, Gingy 'just' gets dipped in milk (mostly off-screen) by an executioner-style heavy, then Lord Farquaad taunts them with their torn-off legs, which suggests legs-first dipping, not the head-first submersion that is the entire point of waterboarding.
Still pretty bad (even though the gingerbread buttons were apparently spared), but... not literal, and not even figurative, waterboarding.
I'm referring to this scene https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYcm_9YELQE
At the opening of the scene, the gingerbread man is being drowned in milk. You see from the shadow, and the voice, that he's having his head submerged in liquid. then Lord Farquaad says "enough! he's ready to talk". So that's simulated drowning as part of interrogation to get information.
Nit-picking about the exact _orientation_ of the victim, and therefore what type of simulated-drowning torture this constitutes, is somewhat missing the point I was trying to make! i.e. that torture is normalised to the point of being slapstick in a children's film.
Yeah, I think the “adult media disguised as kids media” has been a thing for a long time.
But I also think that a lot of teen and preteen media has very little functional distinction from adult media.
A lot of non-parents don’t realize that the difference between G and PG can be huge. Shrek sounds like it should be something for a 3 year old but it really isn’t. Even without the torture scene it’s immediacy really scary. You have to go with something a lot more gentle than that for young kids.
I think the torture scene is funny to an adult as a mockery of the zeitgeist if you decide to interpret it that way. After all, Farquad is intended to be a villain.
It's been dark since the Grimms, and likely long before!
I just rewatched it (link in sibling link). It's mocking Farquaad, but I think is clearly meant to be taken as slapstick. Implying that torture is no big deal.
Why do you still have a television in your home?
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