Buggin'

A kids film about an ant named Flik, brave, innovated but is known for consistently messing things up for his ant colony. After destroying the colonies food supply that was supposed to pay off the villainous grasshoppers he puts on a strong face and embarks on a mission to find a crew to, instead, defend the colony. He finds a motley crew consisting of different kinds of insects with a wide variety of personalities and strengths who ultimately find confidence in themselves and also are able to save the colony from the grasshoppers.

This film teaches kids about the importance of friendship, courage and teamwork despite criticism of teaching kids disappointment through failure and ostracizing others. This film according to Gionettis ideology takes a leftist point of view about reform. This movie promotes differences and wants those that are different to come together for the better of a whole community.

A Bugs Life teaches kids to accept and respect others for their differences. Not all of the bugs are ants and that is widely accepted by the characters in the film. They work as a team with different strengths to accomplish their final goal saving the colony. This message allows kids to believe that they are individuals and even if their strengths are different then those around them they still have something to feel proud of and something they can attribute to a group.

Friendship and courage are also strong themes in this movie. Friendship is shown through all of the relationships between the bugs in the film. You will find that the bugs are often times very supportive of each other, even when they find themselves in hard situations or if they are at fault for something. Courage in this movie is often seen through the main character Flik. Flik is often times found in rough situations ruining things for the colony as a whole but in the end he is proud of all of his hard work, and comes out of his shell to ultimately face what everyone has been afraid of.

It has been said that one of the main problems that parents have within this movie is some of the vulgarity of humor and innuendoes. The lady bug a as a male character, the fat name-calling of the caterpillar and the carless attitude of the roach that mans the circus. These are questionable parts of the movie in terms of gender roles od a 

ge appropriateness.

I think that this movie is a great movie for kids, the messages within the movie are positive and the lessons kids learn from them are something they can take with them as they grow older. Friendship and courage are seen commonly, and can be easily mimicked at a young age. Individuality is also celebrated thought this movie, and when kids are young they often times feel insecure. The gender roles are commonly overlooked, and are incredibly subtle in relation to the movie as a whole. I loved this movie growing up and although I may have looked past these positive lessons I think that some of them have stuck with me on the long run.