Shame
on Pixar
The
Good Dinosaur propagates heinous cultural stereotypes
John
O’Melveny Woods
VeERITAS
Entertainment Group, LA
Point
Clear, Alabama
I was finally excited about a movie. After a slew of
movies I had no interest in, I met one of the animators of The Good Dinosaur at
a film festival in Fairhope, Alabama. She said the movie was terrific. The
trailers also promised a family friendly adventure, Pixar has a stellar
reputation for putting out great entertainment, and I was hooked.
Sitting in the almost empty darkened theater the
other night in Daphne, Alabama, my hopes escalated as the visual beauty of the
movie grabbed me, with very well drawn out characters as dinosaurs and a
typical and well crafted storyline based upon Joseph Campbell’s hero journey
theme. One dinosaur family member, Arlo was always afraid. He would be thrown
into multiple situations to find his inner strength and overcome this fear. It
was set in some distant epoch of the Earth, in which humans were still cave men
-- It took quite a suspension of belief, and it worked. (heck, the dinosaurs
talked).
Great premise...
Imagine my shock and horror when the ‘bad guys’ in
the movie, rustlers that are called Velociraptors were portrayed as being Southerners,
with all the stereotypical attributes that are offensive -- deep accent, an
obvious lack of education, implied inbreeding, and a total lack of concern for
life or limb of anyone else besides themselves. I really was dumfounded. And
just in case anyone misses all of the obvious clues, Pixar names the leader of
the family ‘Bubba’
This was supposedly a family friendly movie, one
that impressionable young people would attend. And what do they portray?
Southerners, not only as the bad guys, but as ignorant rednecks. So all non-
southern children will associate southern accents with ‘bad guys’, and all
southern children will wonder if THEY are “bad guys” for having such an accent.
What adult needs the unnecessary task of having to explain to a child that just
because someone SOUNDS like one of the “bad” dinosaurs, that doesn’t mean they
are “bad” people.
And this is 1,000,000 years ago - I am not sure
there even was a mason Dixon line back then (I am checking that on Wikipedia as soon as I finish writing this
article).
Even the name of the movie portrays these characters
in a negative light; logically, the opposite of the ‘Good’ Dinosaur must be the
“Bad” Dinosaur.
But, what truly confounds me are all the reviews
from credible sources that praise the movie as family friendly while ignoring
this blatantly stereotypical and exploitative
portrayal. Imagine if Pixar had made these ‘rustler’ characters speak like
rappers. Or with Italian mafia accents, or made them sound stereotypically gay?
Why not Bostonian accents? Why an accent at all? It seems obvious: They have purposely
given voice and credence to ignorant and prejudicial misconceptions of Southern
people by portraying them as ignorant, untrustworthy, stupid people. Even more
troubling, the reviewers saw nothing wrong with this.
Pure and simple, this is cultural profiling and it
is insulting and demeaning at its core.
And I would suggest that no southerner even consider
seeing this film, unless you enjoy being stereotyped and insulted, or if you
want to confuse your children and encourage them to have a lowered opinion of
themselves. As a non-southerner myself, I would not recommend this movie to
anybody.
And it is sad. Because at its core, the movie has a
great message.
But the stereotypical portrayal of Southern people
in such a negative light, in a movie made specifically for children, is
unacceptable.
Disney, which should also know better, now owns
Pixar. They, and Pixar, should be ashamed to have released it.
If you would like to contact the Disney Company you
can do so at: www.thewaltdisneycompany.com
- you can email them from there. They provide no phone number.
Mr.
Woods is a writer living in Point Clear, Alabama, and President of VERITAS Entertainment
Group LA. He can be reached at johnw@indietv.com
