The cavalcade of children's cinematic garbage continues with Disney's Chicken Little, a disquieting and falsely innocuous rotten egg of a film that oppresses us with irresponsible gender stereotypes and cruel, offensive behaviour at times when compassion ought to be modelled. Further hampered by a totally derivative plot and an ungainly dependence upon clunky pop music montages (thanks a lot, Shrek...), director Mark Dindal's follow-up to 2000's delightful The Emperor's New Groove is a major disappointment. This is not the way Disney should have launched its foray into non-Pixar computer animation. I regret having seen it.

Before I continue, I feel as though I must defend myself somewhat. You see, I think there is a tendency for people to immediately assume that when an adult unfavourably reviews a children's movie, it is because that person is too old and therefore grossly unqualified to appreciate it for what it is - something made for children's entertainment and consumption, not for deep critical analysis. Suddenly, such an adult takes on the personality of an intellectual killjoy who ought to just leave the poor children alone. After all, if the children are happy, why disturb them? - especially when it gives parents and sitters a couple hours with which to relax. To that, I say children can be happy stuffing themselves with junk food or doing any number of deleterious activities which they don't know any better to avoid. Watching movies like Chicken Little, which is the equivalent of gorging oneself on cheap dollar-store candy, takes the place of more enriching and developmentally engaging pursuits. I do not apologize for wanting something better for our children. As someone who works with children on a daily basis, I care too much about them.

Chicken Little could have been a much better film, to be sure. By now we are all familiar with the basic story: Chicken Little, struck by an acorn on the head one day, believes the sky is falling and sets out with friends along the way to tell the King, who sends them home after kindly telling them that the sky cannot fall and that it was only an acorn that fell. It's a cherished and endearing tale of having the courage and conviction to do the right thing. For nearly the first half of the film, though, Dindal seems to relish stripping away Chicken Little's courage and conviction, cruelly setting him up for pratfalls which the audience is manipulated into laughing at. Children are taught to ridicule those who fervently and courageously attempt to do good when the majority of people scornfully look the other way or chide. They are also taught that grown-ups are, by and large, uncompassionate authoritarians who have no interest in their lives, unlike the king in the actual Chicken Little fable. Children aren't able to grasp satire and hyperbole half as well as older people are; they are undiscerningly observant. Movies like these actually help lay a foundation of mistrust and fear that is unnecessary and damaging, making it look okay to be a bystander if not a relational bully.

The film's second half, of course, sees Chicken Little triumph, and it will be the argument of many that his eventual victory washes away any previous hard feelings. But why should that be acceptable? It's the same tack taken by the fickle characters of the film, who all but make genuine reparations when the time comes for everyone to make friends with him (with the exception of his father in a crucial scene, which did not ring very true and was instead more of a Big Important Dramatic Moment). It suddenly becomes okay to turn on a dime and accept Chicken Little automatically, and nobody need exchange true feelings or "talk things out," as Abby Mallard would prefer (even when Chicken Little and his father do eventually talk). Sentiment, then, is reduced to a false and hollow plot mechanism by the end of the film, and the entire experience is resolutely shallow and insipid.

Obviously, audiences are supposed to be passively strung along, but this is terribly counterproductive when the majority of educators struggle to foster children's critical thinking skills. I may not have liked this movie, but make no mistake - I am a big supporter of quality children's fare. At a time when so many excellent children's films are widely available on home video and DVD, in both animated and live-action form (much of the Disney back catalogue, Japanese Studio Ghibli films, Whale Rider, The Spongebob Squarepants Movie, and the Wallace & Gromit features to name a few), there is absolutely no reason one should see Chicken Little.

(The British Film Institute (BFI) has recently compiled a list of what it believes to be the fifty best must-see children's films. A copy of that list, along with additional information, can be found by clicking here.)