The Agenda Got in the Way

Rating: 3/10 (10 December 2006)

From the previews, this film looked adorable. As soon as I had a break from graduate work, I dragged my best friend to go see this. We anticipated a cute, possibly-sappy "kids'" film. What we saw on the screen shocked and even insulted us.
To begin with, we were very surprised at how sexual some of the content was. For an adult film, this would be tame, but for a kids' film?! The song line about wanting someone's body was certainly not something I would want my niece hearing. Yes, many kids may not pick up on the sexual overtones, but some kids happen to be more observant. Why was it even necessary? It certainly didn't help the film any. I thought it looked rather trashy.
The agenda of this film is what bothered both my friend and I the most. For one thing, we hated the cruel portrayal of Christians. You can bet that if the film unfairly portrayed people of a certain race, there would be theaters refusing to play it. Yet Christians are considered fair game. Making a point against prejudice is fine. I would in fact applaud a film making that point. Doing so by poking fun at a religion (any religion, not just Christianity) is tasteless and should not be tolerated.
The second part of the agenda, the "saving the environment" part, was handled wrong. I have nothing against doing a film about the very real need to protect the environment. It's an excellent idea to motivate people while they're young. However, that theme interfered with the storyline and thus was far less effective than it could have been. It felt to me like the film was trying to accomplish far too much in a single film. This negatively affected the flow of the film.
Overall, I would not recommend the film, especially for families with children. Save yourself the money and rent a good classic instead.