viz.

1978 LEGOS Ad. "a toy that stimulates creativity and imagination for years." Source: Ourlifeintoronto.com

Sometimes, it’s hard to separate a film from the circumstances in which you watch it. In my case, I saw it as a father of a 1-year-old, sitting at the Alamo Drafthouse, following a preshow that included one of the early advertisements for LEGOs, then a European import newly reaching America’s shores. On multiple levels, I kept thinking of how much The LEGO Movie might represent a low point in both how we imagine children’s entertainment, and how we imagine children themselves.

Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

If Frozen (as my previous blog argues) gleefully revises Disney’s traditional iconography, Lilo and Stitch does something far more interesting. Both are, in their ways, re-telling of fairy tales, but Lilo and Stitch proves far weirder, as well as far more intelligent, than its visually-immaculate descendent. We have already discussed Lilo and Stitch once at the Viz blog, praising it for its ability to subvert the “prince charming” narrative. Yet Lilo and Stitch is certainly worth at least one more look. The film is, in fact, both far more critical, and far more thoughtful, than Frozen is. Indeed, the film (despite its rough spots) is sophisticated and thoughtful in a lot of ways that Frozen never dreams of being, and may have something quite important to say about the way we engage with popular children’s stories.