flying, would end up face-down in a puddle and drown. A golfing umbrella, meanwhile, would occasion precisely the opposite effect and the child would end up in France.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
there. Bundle that in with the likelihood of a child taping cardboard wings to their back, shouting“ to infinity and beyond” and throwing themselves down the stairs, and this film is on a one-way ticket to bannedsville.
Home Alone
A health and safety risk from beginning to end. Eating the wrong bubblegum, falling into rivers of chocolate, transmitting oneself into the television: the potential for catastrophic behaviour is everywhere. This is nothing compared to the film’ s most dangerous message however, that it is in some way desirable to grow up into an adult who wears a purple top hat, makes a living experimenting with confectionery and keeps an entire race of Oompa-Loompas subdued. As to what he gets up to in his glass elevator, that’ s a whole other story.
Toy Story
A blowtorch to the hat, a steaming iron to the face, a red-hot doorknob to the hand. It’ s all fun and games isn’ t it? Well no, it isn’ t it. We all cheer the child Kevin McAllister as he applies enhanced interrogation techniques to strangers, but do we ever stop to ask how it might affect the child’ s ability to empathise? Or, more importantly, how it might affect his parents’ ability to pay for their contents insurance? No, no we do not.
How to Train Your Dragon
It has long been said that this film teaches children valuable lessons that they can draw on later into life. But what lessons might they be? Have toys and you’ ll be popular? Turn on the waterworks when you’ re looking for attention? Yes, those are some great lessons right
Dragons can’ t be trained, I’ ve tried.
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