POINT-COUNTERPOINT: Finding Dory
Once again, two students share differing views on the movie Finding Dory, which came out last summer. Below are their reviews.
Positive Review
by Bev H.
Finding Dory isn't about family - it's about living with a disability. The new, long awaited film has opened society's mind about disabilities. The film, Finding Dory, tells the tale of a blue tang fish named Dory who suffers from short-term memory loss. In the film, Dory travels to find her parents, who she lost at a very young age because of her disability. Throughout the film, Dory is guided by her friends, new and old, to be reunited with her long lost parents. The movie is breathtakingly wonderful.
First of all, this sequel has been wanted since the first movie, Finding Nemo, debuted in 2003. People of all ages were on edge after learning about the long-awaited film being produced. On June 17, 2016, Finding Dory was released to the public in USA. The film broke a record after selling $600 million it’s opening weekend.
Secondly, the animation in the film is spectacular. Every detail was spot-on, from the gorgeous scenery to every little detail put into each character. Jeremy Lasky, the film’s cinematographer, did an outstanding job with this motion picture. If the sales don’t say something about his work, I don’t know what will.
Thirdly, the story in Finding Dory was very heartwarming. The film tells Dory’s story from her childhood days to present day. When Dory was a young fish, she had developed short-term memory loss, in her case, made her forget everything that happens within 10 seconds. Because of Dory’s disability, her parents placed seashells back to their house so she will always be able to find her way home in case she gets lost. However, she gets sucked into a tube and is released out into the ocean, away from her home in the aquarium.
Years later, she meets Marlin and Nemo who become her new family, this story being told in the first film, Finding Nemo. A couple years pass and Dory wants to try and find her parents. She searches around the sea, remembering her past as she does so, and soon realizes that her home was in an aquarium.
Once inside the aquarium, Dory is reunited with old and new friends, Destiny the whale shark, Hank the octopus, and many others. Throughout the long, hard journey to finding her parents, however, Dory learns that after her disappearance, her parents went after her, trying to find her. When she finally leaves the aquarium and heads back into the ocean, all hope is restored when she sees trails and trails of seashells all leading to the same place. Dory recognizing them and follows them, leading to a small house. Dory looks around for her parents and before she loses her faith once again, her parents arrive after putting out more seashells. Dory and her parents are finally reunited and become one big, happy family again, not without Marlin or Nemo, of course.
In summary, Finding Dory is overall an astonishing film and meets all expectations and more. Most people say that sequels are never as good as the original, but not in this case. Finding Dory is more than brilliant, more than amazing, more than excellent. Finding Dory is so beautiful. I couldn’t imagine anything better.
Negative Review
by Christian W.
Making fun of autistic disabilities is apparently okay in Disney Films, seeing as how in a recently released film at least two of the characters are continuously battered and called out on their disabilities throughout the film. The film, Finding Dory, was set out to put smiles on not only millions of children but also of the adults who accompanied these children to the movies. In fact the movie did succeed in its endeavor but it didn’t go unnoticed in some of the ways it completed its challenge.
Perhaps one of the most hilarious characters in the film is Gerald. Gerald, although he is the basis of a mighty roar of laughter in the theatre, is portrayed with a disability. We first encounter Gerald the sea lion when Marlin and Nemo try to conversate with Fluke and Rudder, two more advanced sea lions with rather hasty territorial characteristics. These sea lions who dwell on a rock outside of the ocean facility seem well educated seeing as how they have many lines. Gerald on the other hand with his wide eyes, blank stare, and having no lines is obviously coded to where he seems as if he is stupid. Throughout the movie Fluke and Rudder continuously downgrade Gerald, they refuse to give Gerald shelter on their rock forcing him to fend for himself in the ocean alone.
Funny or not this type of comedy should not be used in films, ESPECIALLY not in CHILDREN'S FILMS. If it isn't done in society then it shouldn't be done in a film intended for kids. Unless it is done in society? What a bad mark on Walt Disney’s reputation. Is this what society wants kids to be laughing at. I certainly would be extremely offended if i had a child with a disability and i had seen this disgusting use of so called humor. Where has society’s morals, respect for living beings, and common decency gone?