Review

  • This movie is a kids movie but does not have a good moral. It is a Danish language movie (English dub) and I am writing this from an American perspective, so I'll defer to Europeans for their take on it. But for Americans the moral will not be well thought of. The movie is about bullying and spends almost the entire time (about 80%) showing cruel images of a young boy, Ivan, being abused, which makes for a very uncomfortable 90 minutes. After a long process and very little respite, the movie ends on an abusive note. The moral of the story is that it is better to be abused by a bully than to be a bully. That will not sit well for many people. Also, the implication in the movie was that the adults (school authorities and shopkeepers) were all participants in the cruelty. As for the technical details of the animation, the movie is quite well done, and had the story been even a little bit different, (intervention by school authorities, for example) I would have enjoyed it. As it is, it seems to promote the hopelessness of the victim, and that is a view I'd rather not instill in children.