Recommendation & Background
I think this movie is appropriate for 4th-grade students because it shows what the brotherhood is. The movie takes place in Native American tribe in the Pacific Northwest. The story flows from the three brother; the oldest brave brother Sitka, willful middle brother, Denhai, and the youngest troublemaking brother, Kenai. Each person in the tribes has their own totems. which means all three brothers also have their own totem. Sitka has an eagle, Denhai has a wolf and Kenai gets a beat totem. This bear totem seems to play a role of fortunetelling. They enjoy small fightings physically and verbally and are still close to each other. One day, Sitka is killed by a bear because of this, two brothers decide to revenge on the bear. Finally, Kenai finds the bear and kill it. But this is the end of the story. Unfortunately, Kenai turns into a bear and Denhai, who mistakes the bear for the killer of his brother, try to kill the bear. But finally the Denhai realizes the bear is his younger brother, Kenai. At that time, oldest brother suggests to Kenai that he can be a human. However, Kenai refuse to return to human because he doesn’t want to leave his best bear friend. He wants to live as a bear instead of a human. This whole movie shows that brotherhood is really important to human and animal. So, I think this movie can have a good effect on the 4th graders because the value of human and animals is similar with each other. This can make them regard the life of human and animal valuable.
Entertaining Aspects
I like the way of introducing brotherhood ship in the beginning of the movie though reflection from the survival of Kenai, who introduce the main story which happened a long time ago when he was a kid. A way that movie is starting with the storytelling is a very interesting way to attract the audience attention into the movie. This scene is the exposition part, where all the characters should be introduced and let the audience know where this movie is taking place and the movie gives the audience enough information like the story is about the Denahi’s brother.
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The entertaining aspects of this movie is that it doesn’t seem like an animation movie that came out in 2003, because the details of the movie background are aesthetic and does match well with the theme of movie. Nowadays the majority of Disney movies that are currently on the theatre are 3D animation. This movie is a 2D, which is antique style. In the movie, the graphic is unbelievably similar with that of current animation movie, although it is made about 10years ago.
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I like the ending part of the movie, where Kenai refuse to be a human again. At first Kenai is very depressed about the fact that he is now a bear, which he despises. Then afterwards at the ending part, when he has an opportunity to return into a human, he refuse and to live as a bear because Kenai has earned the most valuable friend. The friendship or the brotherhood between the Kenai and bear is deep and strong that he chose the life of a bear.
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Negative Aspects
The storyline is very inadequate for the 4th grade in the part, where Kenai reveals the secret of bear’s mother. The bear Kenai killed is a mother of the brother bear. This might be confusing and shocking to the 4th graders because they could keep thinking about retaliating over and over.
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The movie seems not to show detailed story about how Kenai and brother bear is getting closer and become best friends. There aren’t any parts showing the conflict between two bears, which will help them to harmonize. The movie takes too much time to show the landscape of the nature and animals, making the storyline short. For instance, the march of the animals takes about 5 minutes and the part where Koda and Kenai are coming to understand is only half time of the marching scene. Then the storyline quickly moves to the Denhai trying to kill the two bears. This is a disappointing point about the time distributing.
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This movie handles the charm, which is believed to direct the destiny from the totem, very seriously. The bear is portrayed as an aggressive destroyer to the village in this movie and Kenai receive totem of the bear, representing love. Kenai is very upset with his totem and argue that he will become a brave man, who can kill the bear. So, he starts to hunt down the bear and kills a bear, which stole the fish from the village.
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Also, I think the cycle of life seems mysterious to kids because they can’t understand the connection between life and death. I think the theme is very similar the one of Buddhism where if one dies, one is reborn as other creatures.
Educational Aspects
First of all it is funny and humorous, especially the two side character, moose and goats make viewers laugh and emotionally moved. Some people could see the totems as a negative belief, but I think this part is also important for children to understand the real life of Indians. It is a good and clean movie with many good lessons while watching. This movie also shows the Christian value like love one's enemy and teach people humans and animals are all brothers. The movie is not violent, but spiritually touching.
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Koda and Kenai looking at the mural about a fight between a human and bear, Koda says, "It's scary". Kenai though Koda was meaning bear and agrees to what Koda says. However, the Koda actually is meaning the human look scary and Kenai think as an opposite. Then, Kenai realizes bears and humans are afraid of each other and attack each other. This could be a good example of misunderstanding each other.
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Evaluation
I think the message from the movie is that human and animal are part of nature and they should take care of with each other based on the love. The lesson starts to be very clear as it towards the end. It shows humans relationship between animal and nature should be valued as a human-to-human relationship. This movie will effectively help the 4th-graders to understand the importance of animal's lives and also a relationship between them and human. The movie is a little bit cornball, which might be fun factors for 4th-graders.
This movie is beautifully animated film with a strong image about loving human and animals. It includes some spiritual factors for young children to understand, but I like the plot of showing the relationship between totem and destiny.
Also, the graphic of the movie is very antique, which gives fresh sensation to the viewers. People nowadays have more interest in 3D movie, but watching this analogue style of animation, I was amazed by the sophisticated style of animation. I was also very tired of the dizzy and magnificent movie, which is filled with cliché. Instead, this movie is like a small but fully stuffed dumpling. I was able to feel the real voice of the movie director.
This movie is beautifully animated film with a strong image about loving human and animals. It includes some spiritual factors for young children to understand, but I like the plot of showing the relationship between totem and destiny.
Also, the graphic of the movie is very antique, which gives fresh sensation to the viewers. People nowadays have more interest in 3D movie, but watching this analogue style of animation, I was amazed by the sophisticated style of animation. I was also very tired of the dizzy and magnificent movie, which is filled with cliché. Instead, this movie is like a small but fully stuffed dumpling. I was able to feel the real voice of the movie director.