Stayed in with my family tonight, a luxury since my brother is in town visiting to celebrate my engagement. After a whirlwind party out in the 'burbs we settled in with a movie on the couch "How to Train Your Dragon". I was excited for an entertaining cartoon, but had little expectations for a take-home message. Boy, was I wrong.
This popular kids' movie really addressed violence and fear of the unknown in a moving and meaningful way. Instead of killing a never-before-seen, deadly species of dragon, a young scrawny (read: brainy) viking assists the wounded animal back to recovery, discovering friendship along the way. He had opportunity to kill the dragon and would not go through with it because he saw some of himself in what his village determined the most dangerous of beasts. In what most people feared, he recognized his own vulnerability as well as the dragon's. He takes time to get to know his enemy and make him his friend, an important message preached by most prophets and religious traditions. Amen to preaching not only nonviolence but loving your neighbor as yourself.
I am not a film critic, nor will I ever attempt to be, but I do recognize a meaningful movie when I see one. While most films condone the vigilante killing for justice, protecting the innocent, destroying the unknown, this movie reveals the mask of redemptive violence and refuses to take part (as well as entertain with funny viking caricatures). My thanks go to the original writer of the book series that spurred this film, Cressida Cowell and the wonderfully imaginative screenwriter who transformed Ms. Cowell's ideas in this film, William Davies, and writer/directors Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders.
