Something your kids can learn

Rating: 9/10 (19 July 2006)

I'm oh-so-bored with cartoons giving the big message that the family is the most important thing in the world. And it felt a bit like this is gonna be another one, with the loving family of possums, porcupines, turtle and squirrel (biologically a bit weird...) Luckily, this is just one of the messages, and not the central one, either.
It's just so great that finally not only serious documentaries but animation films for kids also tackle the issue of consumerism. I think it's terribly important that they are faced with criticism of extreme consumption and what it does to the environment - and to us. Maybe even for adults it's worth thinking over. At least the humans in the story are depicted as stupid, though dangerous, as opposed to the funny but lovely animals. (I find this realistic, too.) The jokes work pretty well not just for children but also for adults, though you need to be good at film history with some of them. And I'm sure I'd have understood much more if the film hadn't been dubbed - but this is really not their fault.