WALKING WITH DINOSAURS

2013, Animal Logic

Animation

Rating: PG

Approx. 87 mins.

THE STORY:

Set 70 million years ago, this tells the story of Patchi (Justin Long), a feisty Pachyrhinosaurus, his bully brother Scowler (Skyler Stone), his bird-mentor Alex (John Leguizamo), and his love interest Juniper (Tiya Sircar). Life is tough for the dinosaurs, and Patchi loses his mother, siblings and father to a predator. When Scowler becomes the leader, his rashness endangers the lives of the pack and Patchi steps in to rescue the tribe. This causes a rift with his brother, and Pachi, Juniper and Alex are forced to struggle alone on their migration journey. Eventually, however, the family is reunited and together they are strong enough to overcome a fierce group of predators to finish their migration journey. 

QUESTIONABLE LANGUAGE:

• nothing significant

VIOLENCE:

• There are fight/ challenge scenes, but nothing scary
• The protagonist is attacked by a predator who takes a chunk out of him, but then is chased off
• The protagonist's father is killed
• The protagonist lies down and begins to be pecked at by predators until he is spurred into self-preservation
• There is a pretty long, intense but non-gory fight scene; no one dies, but an arm is broken on screen

TEACHING POINTS:

• There's a lot of information about dinosaurs, which is a topic lots of kids are fascinated with; it makes a good complement to museum visits and dinosaur learning blocks for younger kids since most of the action gives a sense of what we believe life was like for various types of dinos and there is the interjection of documentary information through voice-overs and dino ID cards

THE UPSHOT:

As a piece or fiction, it's pretty poor; but as an educational tool it is pretty good. If the weak story-line is what it takes to engage those kids not naturally enthralled by dinosaurs, then it's a small price to pay. I wish the story was less cliched, the characters a bit less black and white, and the voices less irritating (every time Scowler lumbered onto the screen I cringed), but the 6 year-old in the room was less concerned with these things. She enjoyed the impressive animation, the romance and the humour. And she learned a thing or two about dinosaurs.  

3.5/5