The Tyranny of The Brady Bunch

This past weekend I attended a children's film festival, and saw 3 films.  2 were from Germany, 1 from Denmark.  I go every year with my kids, it is a fantastic opportunity to see really good foreign films and it's quite cool: they have a reader who reads the subtitles so even little kids who can't read can enjoy the movies.

What really struck me was how un-Disney these films were.  The kids were not well dressed, they had messy hair, and their houses were small and often messy.  Their families were decidedly imperfect: dads were unemployed, parents were divorced or absent, grandma's were not even a little bit nice. 

It made me think about how bad the Brady Bunch made me feel when I was a kid: they were so perfect!  And everything always worked out okay!  AND they could even sing!  I had a happy family, but the Brady Bunch just made me feel like my family was inadequate.  It really made me appreciate these European films I saw on the weekend that were depicting families that were a lot more real than what we usually see on TV these days, on Disney or it's Cdn counterpart, Family channel.  I think that shows like That's So Raven, or The Suite Life (can you tell I have kids??) are cute and funny, but damn, these people are so perfect!

I do think that one reason YCDTOTV was particularly appealing to kids (and why adults really hated it) was that it portrayed these incredibly disfunctional adults, especially dad.  I think presenting kids with a reality where everyone is against them, or they are misunderstood, or they have to be especially sneaky or clever to get around the idiot adults that surround them, is pretty appealing to kids.  I think the willingness to make a show that is totally from this kids' point of view is something that is missing in North American broadcast.  I'd love to hear about what might be out there that I might be missing.
 

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