An Opinion's An Opinion, No Matter How Small

I’d just about given up on finding anything that didn’t deal with any of the nonsense that has engulfed our media (in “dead Diana” mode, as The Eternal Molly Ivins once called it) when I came across this HuffPo post from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Kareem, he of the killer sky-hook shot and the five-minute movie career, has detected a problem with the new animated movie Horton Hears A Who! based on the Dr. Seuss book, of course, and voiced by Jim Carrey, Steve Carrell, Jesse McCartney, and Carol Burnett, among others…

How can a beloved Dr. Seuss story do so much harm? Well, the original book by Dr. Seuss is just fine, a timeless tale that has been delighting children since it was first published in 1954. The story of the brave elephant that is willing to endure the harshest condemnation from his friends and community in order to protect those in need is a wonderful lesson for children.

But then along comes the movie. To make the story long enough for a full-length movie, a sub-plot was added about the mayor of Whoville who has 96 cheerful daughters and one brooding son. This is where things take a nasty turn. Basically, the mayor ignores his 96 daughters in order to groom his uninterested son to become mayor. Why doesn't he groom one of his much more enthusiastic daughters? And, of course, it is the brooding son who, in the end, saves the entire world of Whoville. The daughters? They get to cheer from the sidelines.

And Abdul-Jabbar states that this movie has done more harm than the spate of Iraq war films (Rendition, Stop-Loss, Lambs for Lions, Redacted, In the Valley of Elah, etc.) have done good.

Ummm….

Well, to begin with, I should tell you that the young one and I saw this movie a few weeks ago, and being a boy, he had no trouble with it, of course. But for the benefit of anyone reading this who isn’t a parent, I should tell you that kids have a pretty highly developed sense of what is phony and what isn’t. Meaning that if this movie were really set up in such a manner that little JoJo (the boy) was supposed to be supported by his smarter sisters at every turn but wasn’t, my son would have looked up at me and said something like “Dad, how come his sisters aren’t doing anything instead?” Yes, really.

What I mean is that I don’t think it would have been possible to satisfy Abdul-Jabbar’s concerns here without fundamentally changing the original story, and Abdul-Jabbar said he was OK with it (the book of course, not the movie).

Besides, the way the story is told mainly in the movie, JoJo is kind of quiet and brooding throughout (or at least utterly bored and disenchanted), which Abdul-Jabbar admits, though he ends up recognizing that his father the mayor is right when he claims that the town is in trouble. Would he prefer that some of the girls be portrayed as indifferent also?

I think trying to read sexism into this movie (and Abdul-Jabbar goes one step beyond, as they say, by indicating that the movie condones racism because it condones sexism also - ???) is more than a little bit of a stretch. Would he be happy if the filmmakers had added a scene where one of the 96 daughters (God, is the Whoville mayor Wilt Chamberlain?) had said, “Oh yeah, I helped JoJo with that noise-making thingamabob doohickey whatsit device of his”?

(I’m trying to be polite in my criticism because, though he’s probably a peace-loving Muslim, Abdul-Jabbar is also a very tall man who, when provoked, could quite possibly kick my ass.)

I’m sure Abdul-Jabbar loves all kids, and I don’t blame him as a father for being protective. It’s an admirable instinct. However, after trying to decipher his argument, I ended up with the same headache I once had while trying to read “Green Eggs And Ham” with half a load on (nothing induces the throbbing at one’s temples such as repeating lines like, “Would you eat them in house? Would you eat them with a mouse? Would you eat them in a box? Would you eat them with a fox?” over and over and over).

Besides, based on what I noted here (third topic), boys have at least as much to be concerned about in early development as girls – maybe more, actually (and if he’s going to criticize the movie of Horton Hears A Who!, then he could at least comment on the fact that Jim Carrey, who happily is fairly restrained throughout the production, sounds an awful lot like Steve Carrell, and it’s hard to tell the two of them apart).