Ponyo (2009)

Racing the Tsunami
Ponyo at MOVIECLIPS.com

Entertainment Rating: 3/5

I remembered hearing the name of this movie quite a bit around Oscar season and had a small desire to see what it was all about. However, I’ve never really watched any anime films and the premise to this one didn’t sound terribly intriguing: a fish wants to become human (pretty much based on H.C. Andersen’s Little Mermaid). Our kids enjoyed the movie and I almost did. The musical score for the film was excellent and the story did turn out to be interesting enough, but it didn’t really conclude anything. We were left with more questions than answers. (Voices by Tina Fey, Matt Damon, Liam Neeson, Betty White, Frankie Jonas, Cate Blanchett, Noah Cyrus)

Orson Scott Card gives examples of some of these unanswered questions:

What did the ocean's attack on the shore accomplish? How did a little boy's promise resolve the conflict between humans and the life of the sea? Who are the little fish-girl's parents and what are they trying to accomplish? What are the rules of the magic in this imagined universe?

Moral Rating: 3/5

Sosuke is able to love Ponyo whether she remains human or is turned back into a fish. Sosuke’s family relationship also provides us with some important insights. Their life is not very easy without a father at home; Lisa, Sosuke’s mother, needs her husband’s help and support with taking care of the house and Sosuke; and Sosuke needs a father around to give him a role model to look up to while he’s growing up. The scene with them communicating via light signals was a particularly touching one, very realistic.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) sums up the moral messages in the movie quite concisely:

...the underlying moral messages, such as the repeated admonition to judge by substance rather than appearance and a deftly delivered warning against environmental carelessness, are universal.

The Princess and the Frog

Synopsis

A lazy prince turns into a frog and must get a princess to kiss him before he remains one permanently. When the frog mistakenly kisses a servant girl dressed up as a princess, she too becomes a frog, and together they must find a princess for him to kiss.

Entertainment Value - B

Great jazz music and humor; an all around fun story. Definitely different from all of Disney's other princess stories.

Moral Value - Failure to Communicate? - 3

The message presented isn't very strong. We're somewhat shown the importance of a good work ethic and gaining an education. There's quite a contrast between the work ethic of Tiana and Prince Naveen, the former works too hard and the latter plays too much. The two learn that there must be a balance between work and play.

We see a good model for friendship between Tiana and Charlotte. This relationship is important in not only overlooking racial barriers, but also class barriers which can sometimes be hard to overlook without the rich person becoming too condescending or the poorer one too covetous.

Tiana and Prince Naveen fell in love way too quick, even for a fairy tale. In less than a day they go from having nothing in common to falling in love. Maybe some relationships don't need years (or even a year) to mature before feeling ready to take the plunge into marriage, but a day is ridiculous. (This would be a fault in many princess movies - Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and Cinderella; but there are some good examples of developed relationships with Beauty and the Beast and Enchanted, to name a few.)

The Shadow man (villain) was a little dark with all the voodoo and communicating with "the other side" (not sure if this meant just those dead, or more likely dealing with the dark, shadowy side with the devil and his minions). Though dark, it did seem rather fitting with the setting being New Orleans, but might be a little scary for kids afraid of shadows.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Synopsis
A cinematic piece of art that comments on the sometimes destructive nature of intelligence.  From apes, to humans, to computers, each are portrayed as scheming, murderous creatures.

Our Take
I'd put this film up there with Citizen Kane, another cinematic piece of art that isn't amazing but worth seeing at least once.  I've definitely never seen anything like this before, with almost half of the movie containing no dialogue and a good part of it just flashing lights and intense music.  Very creative to say the least, and visually stunning especially for it's time.

Moral Value
I didn't get a whole lot out of the movie until I read the summary provided on Wikipedia and made a few more realizations.  For instance, the satellite that resembled the bone that was thrown in the air was actually used to control nuclear weapons, an obvious parallel to the apes use of the bone as a weapon.  Intelligence brought great advances to both the primitive and futuristic societies but also pain and destruction.

Maybe I could have gotten a little more out of it by first reading Nietzche's essay that supposedly discusses the origin of man entitled Thus Spake Zarathustra, which is also the name of one of the orchestral themes of the movie.  In addition, the ending was rather bizarre but seemed to parallel HAL's reverting back to his "childhood."  Given the abstract format of the film I'm sure I did not grasp the whole meaning of the film, and due to the fact that Kubrick (the writer) never published the "philosophical and allegorical meaning of the film," any interpretation is pure speculation.

Why can't directors (or whoever's in charge of getting a movie to get a certain MPAA rating) try to give more mature-themed (thought provoking, philosophical, inspirational) movies a 'G' rating instead of thinking that mature audiences will only appreciate films if they have a lot of sex, violence, and profanity?