If I said we have a lot to learn from kids films, there may be people who wouldn’t believe me. In this blog, I’m going to break down what we can learn from these crackers of filmmaking. Be warned though I will be giving spoilers to some films if you haven’t seen them yet.
1. Motive
Finding a motivation for your protagonist can be really hard. How complicated do you need to make it? In many kids films it can be they have a goal or they need to learn something. Finding Nemo, the motivation is for Marlin to find his son, Nemo. In Brave, Merida strives to forge her own path much to the annoyance initially of her mother.
It can be as simple or as complicated as you want. In many writing books, there’s a lot of reference to conscious and unconscious needs. The conscious need might be what drives the story forward of the events going on, ie in The Princess Diaries Mia is told she is to be a Princess of the country Genovia. The unconscious need may be overcoming something, ie in The Princess Diaries Mia has to find her voice and overcome her fear of public speaking.
2. Journey Of Discovering Self
While the characters in kids films go on some kind of journey towards a goal, there may be some learning about themselves along the way. There might be something they had all along hiding under the surface.
In films like Kung Fu Panda, you’re led along a journey of self discovery. Yes, in my example Po is focusing on becoming the Dragon Warrior. It’s only when he finally gets the scroll and finds it contains a mirrored surface does he find that the ingredients to be the Dragon Warrior was himself (or whoever wielded the scroll) all along.
3. Understandable Villains
Like my first point in the blog, knowing clearly what your villain is after is really helpful in making your antagonist understandable. They might be wronged by something someone did and seeks vengeance like in Big Hero Six. They might be after something they don’t have and will do anything to get it like in 101 Dalmatians.
Making it clear what your villain is after will help you find what stance each character takes. Your protagonist must stand in their way. Knowing what stops either protagonist and antagonist will deepen your character development.
4. Learning A Lesson
I briefly touched on this in the first point. It doesn’t have to be blindly obvious they’re learning something. It might be a theme you’re playing with. The lesson could be to become less selfish like Maui does in Moana. It could be learning about teamwork like the Walker kids in Swallows and Amazons.
There are a lot of lessons kids can learn from. Seeing characters they grow to love learn something can help them learn the same lessons too. You’d be surprised what kids notice.
5. Balancing Humour
Having humour in stories is a given, right? You may have sat through many films like I have. Balancing humour when there are dark bits to the story too are just as important. Things may not always go to plan. It breaks up the dark bits when the going gets tough.
In Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang there are oodles of hilarious bits to break up the threats. The children have to learn to work as a team during WW2 to keep the farm. While the threat seems to get nearer, there’s the fun with the dancing piglets and the shake up in the sleeping arrangements. The humour doesn’t always have to be for kids either. With the threat of losing the farm looming over them, it comes to light the uncle has been gambling and he’s being threatened with being stuffed. Just as all seems lost, the magic of Nanny McPhee and the children as the bomb looms from the field, it wipes it all away in a rather funny fashion.
The humour can be dark as well as light. It’s all about finding the balance. There are so many good examples out there. You just need to find them.
While they entertain the kids very well, kids films are also a great education to us writers. Clear storytelling and character development will only strengthen your own writing. So, what are you waiting for?
Happy viewing!