Desperately Seeking Peter Rabbit: Sony Pictures Misses the Mark

 

Following swiftly upon the heels of Netflix’s much panned Anne of Green Gables: Sturm und Drang (Not the title of the film, but you get the idea), in which her mean adoptive father dies of a heart attack after beating Anne senseless, a creepy man with suggestions of molester or pedophile almost kidnaps her before she is saved by the film’s conflicted and bizarre incarnation of Matthew Cuthbert, the patriarchy is strong in the person of the local vicar who wants Anne to stay at home and “learn proper housekeeping until she marries,” and there are undertones of mania and overtones of lesbianism breaking out all over the place.

OK, that first paragraph wasn’t exactly a sentence (I see that, Ricochet Editor), but I got so worked up about the violence done to a beloved childhood classic that I was in danger of losing the thread (not a feeling I’m used to), or of becoming, at the very least, undiagrammable (a cardinal sin). So, best quit while I’m ahead.

Now we have the new “Peter Rabbit” movie which, as far as I can see, has almost nothing to do with Beatrix Potter, and almost everything to do with “play[ing] to a modern audience for a family film by turning the movie into a joke machine with the subtlety of a manic Madagascar movie,” according to this review from Tulsa World.

Right. Because beloved tales that have stood the test of time for decades or more than a century, and which have taken millions of children to places of safety, imagination, adventure, and love, just aren’t smart or good enough for the modern young mind.

In a startlingly tone-deaf move this time, though, the Peter Rabbit crew have run afoul of political correctness and the intersectionality gods in at least one of their entertaining brainwaves.

You see, Mr. McGregor (no, not the real one. He’s dead. His hateful nephew Tom, who has taken over the lettuce patch), is allergic to blackberries. So there’s a scene in the movie where the nasty rabbits, led by that rascal Peter, pelt him with blackberries until one flies into his mouth. Tom collapses in a heap, goes into anaphylactic shock, and rescues himself only by stabbing himself in the leg with an EpiPen.

Way to go, Sony Pictures. Children’s movie making at its best. Or a campaign ad for Joe Manchin. Not sure which. Probably doesn’t matter.

Anyway, there is a massive backlash against bullying and making light of food allergies on the one hand, and accusations of “snowflakery” on the other, all leading to the predictable groveling Sony apology:

Sony Pictures says Sunday in a joint statement with the filmmakers that “food allergies and are a serious issue” and the film “should not have made light” of a character being allergic to blackberries “even in a cartoonish, slapstick way.”

The studio and filmmakers say that they, “Sincerely regret not being more aware and sensitive to this issue, and we truly apologize.”

Umm. Yeah. And so you should.

Not so much for a tasteless and insensitive scene about bullying, food allergies, and the EpiPen ad, as for, once again demonstrating your utter lack of imagination and originality, and for showing that you corrupt and diminish everything you touch. And for, very likely, turning off a generation of children and their parents to the magical world of Peter Rabbit and his friends. Good job. Hope you lose a bundle on this one.

For a rare exception to the practice of mangling and perversely misdirecting a beloved children’s book into a shallow and unsettling movie, look no further than Babe (nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1996. I’m sorry it lost to Braveheart, much as I enjoyed the sight of Mel Gibson’s bare bum.) One of the few absolutely perfect movies ever made. Apparently, though, they made it, and someone either forgot the formula, or broke the mold. Sad.

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  1. James Gawron Inactive
    James Gawron
    @JamesGawron

    She (View Comment):

    James Gawron (View Comment):

    She: Not so much for a tasteless and insensitive scene about bullying, food allergies, and the EpiPen ad, as for, once again demonstrating your utter lack of imagination and originality, and for showing that you corrupt and diminish everything you touch.

    She,

    Do save this sentence in memory. You will be able to use it so often when reviewing the latest attempts at art.

    A culture of the perverse, by the perverse, and for the perverse.

    Regards,

    Jim

    Hi, Jim

    Yep. And thanks. Always good to hear from you, for old time’s sake, if nothing else. Hope you’re doing OK.

    Regards

    She

    She,

    I am doing well thanks for your good thoughts. Don’t you think that we could give the destroyers of “Peter Rabbit” a serious flogging or how about a nice keelhauling. You know just for old times sake.

    Regards,

    Jim

    • #31
  2. Hartmann von Aue Member
    Hartmann von Aue
    @HartmannvonAue

    Quake Voter (View Comment):
    The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends, created by Diane Jackson, is maybe the most faithful animation in spirit and painstaking artistic execution that I’ve seen in past 40 years.

    Yeah, this set is amazing. If you don’t have  it and have children of the appropriate age, get it today or see if your local library has it.

    • #32
  3. Nanda Panjandrum Member
    Nanda Panjandrum
    @

    Hartmann von Aue (View Comment):

    Quake Voter (View Comment):
    The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends, created by Diane Jackson, is maybe the most faithful animation in spirit and painstaking artistic execution that I’ve seen in past 40 years.

    Yeah, this set is amazing. If you don’t have it and have children of the appropriate age, get it today or see if your local library has it.

    Even if you don’t have children; btw, the appropriate age is how old you are today… :-)

     

    • #33
  4. Postmodern Hoplite Coolidge
    Postmodern Hoplite
    @PostmodernHoplite

    For the record, I did just try to diagram the opening sentence of the OP…oy vey!

    So, that leads me to ask: Is good writing still good writing, even when it isn’t “good” writing?

    In this case I would suggest, “yes, indeed”.

    • #34
  5. She Member
    She
    @She

    Postmodern Hoplite (View Comment):
    For the record, I did just try to diagram the opening sentence of the OP…oy vey!

    So, that leads me to ask: Is good writing still good writing, even when it isn’t “good” writing?

    In this case I would suggest, “yes, indeed”.

    Bless your heart!

    • #35
  6. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    She: I got so worked up about the violence done to a beloved childhood classic

    The left has been destroying traditional literature for years using violence, homosexuality, racism, and human depravity.  Nothing new here . . .

    • #36
  7. Nanda Panjandrum Member
    Nanda Panjandrum
    @

    Stad (View Comment):

    She: I got so worked up about the violence done to a beloved childhood classic

    The left has been destroying traditional literature for years using violence, homosexuality, racism, and human depravity. Nothing new here . . .

    Just because it’s not new doesn’t mean one can’t/shouldn’t be distressed by it, does it, @stad@She has shared elsewhere here what a touchstone those stories were in her peripatetic childhood.  I’m glad she still gets het up about things occasionally. :-)

    • #37
  8. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Peter Rabbit didn’t need a remake. My girls must have watched this bit of perfection a few dozen times:

     

    • #38
  9. MarciN Member
    MarciN
    @MarciN

    There’s a second Peter Rabbit in kiddie lit: Thornton Burgess, a native of Sandwich, Massachusetts, had a character named Peter Rabbit in his stories as well. His collection called Old Mother West Wind was first published in 1910. My kids loved his stories in the book Thornton Burgess Bedtime Stories, and we used to visit the museum at least once a year. :)

    • #39
  10. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    Nanda Panjandrum (View Comment):

    Stad (View Comment):

    She: I got so worked up about the violence done to a beloved childhood classic

    The left has been destroying traditional literature for years using violence, homosexuality, racism, and human depravity. Nothing new here . . .

    Just because it’s not new doesn’t mean one can’t/shouldn’t be distressed by it, does it, @stad? @She has shared elsewhere here what a touchstone those stories were in her peripatetic childhood. I’m glad she still gets het up about things occasionally. :-)

    I know what you mean.  I got upset when DC had Superman renounced his U.S. citizenship.  No more truth, justice and The American Way . . .

    • #40
  11. She Member
    She
    @She

    Nanda Panjandrum (View Comment):

    Stad (View Comment):

    She: I got so worked up about the violence done to a beloved childhood classic

    The left has been destroying traditional literature for years using violence, homosexuality, racism, and human depravity. Nothing new here . . .

    Just because it’s not new doesn’t mean one can’t/shouldn’t be distressed by it, does it, @stad? @She has shared elsewhere here what a touchstone those stories were in her peripatetic childhood. I’m glad she still gets het up about things occasionally. :-)

    “het up”–wonderful expression.  Not used enough today, IMHO.  Funnily enough, I used it in a letter to a friend yesterday, just before I read your comment.  Funny to see it here.

    I think my dad’s side of the family feels very proprietorial towards Beatrix Potter, as he and all his siblings were raised on the tales.  There was a bookshelf, half-way up the main staircase of the enormous old family home with all the books (some of them probably first editions), and I used to sit on the landing for hours at a time reading them when I was very young.

    “When they’re runnin’ down my Beatrix Potter, man, They’re walkin’ on the fightin’ side of me.”

    Can I say that, or is that too much cultural appropriation?

    • #41
  12. kylez Member
    kylez
    @kylez

    Misthiocracy, Joke Pending (View Comment):

    Whenever you see the words “Sony Animation” pop up on the screen, you can be pretty assured that whatever comes next is going to be a travesty.

    Compare it to the wonderful job that StudioCanal did on the Paddington movie adaptations.

    To wit: Paddington was directed by Paul King, who has worked extensively in British comedy, including shows like Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, The Mighty Boosch, and the film Bunny And The Bull. By contrast, Peter Rabbit is directed by Will Gluck, whose credits include such illustrious titles as The John Larroquette Show, Andy Richter Controls The Universe, Easy A, Friends With Benefits, and the recent remake of Annie.

    Cough.

    Easy A is hilarious. 

    • #42
  13. kylez Member
    kylez
    @kylez

    Other companies have been able to make it work. Blue Sky Studios (owned by 20th Century Fox) did a pretty great job with The Peanuts Movie

    after seeing Peter Rabbit I was contrasting it with The Peanuts Movie, which was done with much respect for the original material.

    • #43
  14. CarolJoy, Above Top Secret Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret
    @CarolJoy

    How my head hurts when I think about this.  Just a few years ago, Political Correctness was called for in certain circles. But now to be Politically Correct, any and all remarks, stories and films must be altered to remind the audience of the pernicious evil that lies in the hearts of all men. And much of the action must show the absolute total destruction of anything that a female attempts to pursue.

    I expect a newly revised copy of “Black Beauty” to come out soon. The hero stallion of the tale will no longer pursue a friendship with Ginger, as she will ignore stallions and only acknowledge other fillies who are equine lesbians. This revised novel will no doubt be accompanied by a lengthy bio pic showing us that Anna Sewell wrote this book despite the numerous incestuous attacks and actual rapes she received at the hands of nearly every man she encountered during her life. If the historical documentation of any of the events is lacking, the historian can simply assume Ms Sewell was simply too humiliated to discuss such atrocities.

    Of course, who knows if kids even get a chance to partake of the old children’s classics any more? There are much more important considerations for kids to deal with these days than reading books.

    Last Sunday night we had our TV tuned to either CBS or NBC at 7Pm Pacific time. There was an entire one hour “active news” show that depicted the essential need for all schools in the San Francisco Bay area to expand on their human sexuality courses.

    This is all being done just in case some kindergartner is as a boy wearing his mom’s beads and bracelets, or in case  some tomboy is playing with her brother’s sports equipment. Parents must not wait  a single moment to act on the troubled child’s inner inclinations and that child’s cry for help. Instead, for the good  of the child, the family and society, the child must be told how important they are for being willing to acknowledge their discontent with the gender they were born with.

    The child can then be immediately transitioned into wearing the clothes and adopting the lifestyle of the opposite sex. Once  12 years old, they will be given a shot to delay the hormones in order to avoid the physiological changes that their birth sex would cause and instead begin to undergo switching out their sex organs.  Parents and child congratulate each other constantly about how amazing it is that all involved have such advanced understanding of such a situation. In many interviews, families showed reporters how as supportive parents, their lives revolved around the necessary sex changes.

    One thing especially alarming: there were few commercials – only 2 mins or so of them at the quarter & half hour marks. Usually an hour show only has 41 minutes of actual content as the rest is commercials. Who paid for this to be handled this way?

    • #44
  15. Percival Thatcher
    Percival
    @Percival

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    How my head hurts when I think about this. Just a few years ago, Political Correctness was called for in certain circles. But now to be Politically Correct, any and all remarks, stories and films must be altered to remind the audience of the pernicious evil that lies in the hearts of all men. And much of the action must show the absolute total destruction of anything that a female attempts to pursue.

    I expect a newly revised copy of “Black Beauty” to come out soon. The hero stallion of the tale will no longer pursue a friendship with Ginger, as she will ignore stallions and only acknowledge other fillies who are equine lesbians. This revised novel will no doubt be accompanied by a lengthy bio pic showing us that Anna Sewell wrote this book despite the numerous incestuous attacks and actual rapes she received at the hands of nearly every man she encountered during her life. If the historical documentation of any of the events is lacking, the historian can simply assume Ms Sewell was simply too humiliated to discuss such atrocities.

    Of course, who knows if kids even get a chance to partake of the old children’s classics any more? There are much more important considerations for kids to deal with these days than reading books.

    Last Sunday night we had our TV tuned to either CBS or NBC at 7Pm Pacific time. There was an entire one hour “active news” show that depicted the essential need for all schools in the San Francisco Bay area to expand on their human sexuality courses.

    This is all being done just in case some kindergartner is as a boy wearing his mom’s beads and bracelets, or in case some tomboy is playing with her brother’s sports equipment. Parents must not wait a single moment to act on the troubled child’s inner inclinations and that child’s cry for help. Instead, for the good of the child, the family and society, the child must be told how important they are for being willing to acknowledge their discontent with the gender they were born with.

    The child can then be immediately transitioned into wearing the clothes and adopting the lifestyle of the opposite sex. Once 12 years old, they will be given a shot to delay the hormones in order to avoid the physiological changes that their birth sex would cause and instead begin to undergo switching out their sex organs. Parents and child congratulate each other constantly about how amazing it is that all involved have such advanced understanding of such a situation. In many interviews, families showed reporters how as supportive parents, their lives revolved around the necessary sex changes.

    One thing especially alarming: there were few commercials – only 2 mins or so of them at the quarter & half hour marks. Usually an hour show only has 41 minutes of actual content as the rest is commercials. Who paid for this to be handled this way?

    Everything older than Heather has Two Mommies will be banned.

    • #45
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