The disappearance of the seven dwarves
Posted by Harrison Scott Key
May 25, 2007
Worldviews blog

There’s a long road between Sleeping Beauty and Shrek. One is completely on the level, but sentimental – the other is completely ironic, but sentimental. As Denby says in The New Yorker:

The Shrek phenomenon is one of those seeming oddities in our culture—children being entertained with derision before they’ve been ravished by awe [...] Shrek is postmodernism for towheads, pastiche for the potty-trained.Denby’s talking about how animated children’s movies these days tend toward cheek and anti-establishment derision, whereas old Disney pics tended toward the more conventional ethos of the fairytale. Good point, and a good piece. The short answer is that we get movies like Shrek because studios want the the adults in the audience to laugh, too (that is, adults who've brought their children). But the longer answer has something to do with the increasingly-blurry line between children and adults. Read The Disappearance of Childhood by Neil Postman.

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