March of the Penguins

I don’t know if anyone has seen this film yet - I haven’t, but that’s certainly not going to stop me discussing it.

As far as I can gather it’s a currently very popular PG movie about the epic migration of penguins in the Antarctic. All good so far, after all I’m not here to knock the hard working penguins.

However…

The film was advertised on TV the other day and, after showing clips of the cute little penguins slogging through miles of bitter cold snow, it finished with this warning message…

‘WARNING: Contains Scenes of Mild Trauma’.

What? What?

What the hell is that? Do we really have to warn kids about the possibility of mild trauma? I guarantee you the reason the film is successful is because it contains a degree of trauma. Without a bit of hazard and fright a film is just plain boring - and kids know this better than anyone.

If you doubt this fact just look at the film ‘Bambi’. This was not a record braking movie because the little fawn’s mummy lived a long and happy life…

But, being the progressive new age man I am, I’m prepared to get on board with the idea that our kids need to be completely protected from anything that might possibly upset them (thereby preparing them nicely for life in the real world). With this in mind I offer the following warnings for some classic children’s tales:

Cinderella
Contains bullying and ugly people

Hansel and Gretel
Contains attempted cannibalism and child murder

Little Red Riding Hood
Contains cross-dressing and decapitation

The Elves and the Shoemaker
Contains exploitation of Middle Earth labour.

Snow-White and the Seven Dwarves
Contains choking hazard

The Three Little Pigs
Contains breaking and entering, vandalism and threatening behaviour.

Black Beauty
Contains scenes of inter-racial sex (…actually this might not have been a kid’s movie…)