5 Disney Movies That Are Really Meant For Grown Ups
The Walt Disney company makes great movies. We all have our favorites, and even at 28, I still sit down to watch Hercules whenever I can (From zero to hero in no time flat!), and my friends and I constantly quote The Emperor’s New Groove in daily conversations.
Now, Disney obviously markets their films to younger children, but the writers will throw in some “adult humor” for the grown-ups in the audience. Normally this goes right over the child’s head, and makes it fun for the adults in the audience to watch an animated movie.
But sometimes Disney likes to make movies where the stories are geared more for adults, but marketing for kids because they’re animated Disney movies. Well, as a HUGE Disney fan, I decided to take on the challenge and present:
5 Disney Movies That Are Really Meant For Grown Ups
Based on the novel by Victor Hugo, THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME is the story of Quasimodo, the disfigured bell ringer of Notre Dame Cathedral. After killing Quasimodo’s mother on the steps of Notre Dame, Judge Claude Frollo also tries to kill her baby by dropping him into a well. However, being a god fearing man, (and being caught by the Achdeacon of Notre Dame)he instead takes Quasimodo and raises him as his own son. Granted, he forbids Quasimodo to leave his bell tower, but hey, at least he let the kid live.
Quasimodo ends up leaving to visit the Festival of Fools. At the festival a riot from Frollo’s guards, and the gypsy Esmeralda saves him from the crowds. Because she helped Quasimodo, Frollo declares Esmeralda under arrest, but she escapes. Frollo then declares her a fugitive.
The premise sounds like it’d be great for a kid’s movie. Learning that being different is okay, that the villain is always wrong, etc. BUT the way that The Hunchback of Notre Dame goes about this is what makes this a Disney movie for adults.
It’s dark. And not just dark like parts of Bambi are dark, it’s dark in the way that Quadimodo’s mother’s death is shown, that Frollo sings a song called “hellfire” about the lust he feels towards Esmeralda, and Esmeralda is a match lighting short of being burned at the stake.
While I loved UP, and it is a movie that is suitable for kids, Up also has huge adult themes.
When you lose the love of your life, what else is left? And how are you supposed to carry on? And when the person you love makes you promise to go on, how do you keep that promise?
Carl Fredricksen keeps his promise of visiting the town of Paradise Falls to his now dead wife (talk about sobbing at a movie. I don’t think I’ve cried that hard EVER) Ellie by using hundreds of balloons to make his house fly.
The love and devotion that are the main themes in Up, which make it a movie with a message for adults with children’s humor added in for good measure.
Anyone that says WALL-E is strictly a kids movie didn’t quite understand it and should see it again. After mass consumerism hits the planet, humans have wiped out anything useful on earth, leaving it a broken, trash filled heap.
Any movie that has planet earth destroyed because of environmental issues are going to go right over the head’s of the kids, and instead make the adults watching it feel like CRAP. And hopefully start to recycle.
Wall-E did just that. Wall-E is a trash compactor robot, and his job to clean up the planet so earth’s ecosystem can get back on track. While he’s cute, and meets a girl robot Eve, the overall story and lessons that are to be learned are much more geared for adults than to children.
Yes, it’s based in historical fact, and yeah, POCAHONTAS has cute wildlife friends. But overall Pocahontas is the story of tolerance, and putting aside prejudices and working together.
While kids love the singing, adults can learn that – once again – man is horrible and basically ripped away land from another culture to make money for a different country. Not to mention the disregard for the environment, which is in complete opposition of how Pocahontas‘ people treat the earth.
Let me say that FINDING NEMO is one of my FAVORITE Disney movies. It’s perfect for kids and adults, but the main story of Marlin searching for his lost son Nemo, shows the parent/child bond like no other.
Not only does it show that parents will do anything for their children, it also tells the story of how children can adapt and survive without their parents. Nemo got into a lot of trouble, but he was smart enough to stay alive, even without his father’s help.
Marlin just needed to let go a little bit in order to see how special Nemo really was.
This list was difficult for me, because what Disney movie doesn’t have an adult theme? Let me know what others jump into your head and comment below!
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