Croods, The: A New Age

image for Croods, The: A New Age

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Not suitable under 6; parental guidance to 7 (violence and scary scenes)

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This topic contains:

  • overall comments and recommendations
  • details of classification and consumer advice lines for Croods, The: A New Age
  • a review of Croods, The: A New Age completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 21 December 2020.

Overall comments and recommendations

Children under 6 Not suitable due to violence and scary scenes.
Children aged 6–7 Parental guidance recommended due to violence and scary scenes.
Children aged 8 and over Ok for this age group.

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Australian Government Classification Board and the associated consumer advice lines. Other classification advice (OC) is provided where the Australian film classification is not available.

Name of movie: Croods, The: A New Age
Classification: PG
Consumer advice lines: Mild themes and animated violence
Length: 96 minutes

ACCM review

This review of the movie contains the following information:

A synopsis of the story

The Croods: A New Age begins with seeing Guy (voice of Ryan Reynolds) orphaned as a child. He grows up alone but as a teenager he meets Eep (Emma Stone), a member of the Crood family. It is instant attraction and Guy is welcomed into the Crood family. Eep’s father, Grug (Nicolas Cage), however, is not happy with the thought of Guy and Eep setting out on their own and leaving the tribe.

Grug therefore, sets out to find a paradise where they will all be happy and, in doing so, finds the walled home of Phil (Peter Dinklage) and Hope (Leslie Mann) Betterman. The Bettermans were friends of Guy's parents and sees this chance encounter as their answer to finding their daughter, Dawn (Kelly Marie Tran), a partner in Guy. The Bettermans believe they are better and more evolved than the Croods and set out to rid themselves of the Croods, while keeping Guy. However, things get complicated when Grug eats the forbidden fruit – bananas, and they find themselves under attack by an army of aggressive punch monkeys.

Themesinfo

Children and adolescents may react adversely at different ages to themes of crime, suicide, drug and alcohol dependence, death, serious illness, family breakdown, death or separation from a parent, animal distress or cruelty to animals, children as victims, natural disasters and racism. Occasionally reviews may also signal themes that some parents may simply wish to know about.

Prehistoric era; Cavemen and women; Teen romance; Survival.

Use of violenceinfo

Research shows that children are at risk of learning that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution when violence is glamourised, performed by an attractive hero, successful, has few real life consequences, is set in a comic context and / or is mostly perpetrated by male characters with female victims, or by one race against another.

Repeated exposure to violent content can reinforce the message that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution. Repeated exposure also increases the risks that children will become desensitised to the use of violence in real life or develop an exaggerated view about the prevalence and likelihood of violence in their own world.

There is a lot of violence throughout this movie such as punching, throwing rocks and spears, and physical combat. Some examples include:

  • Eep punches her brother, Thunk, several times.
  • Eep and Guy are chased by a pack of dinosaurs who bite at their heels.
  • Grug and Guy fight physically.
  • Thunk throws a stick which stabs a chicken in the eye. Grug imagines throwing a stick at Phil and stabbing him in the eye.
  • An army of monkeys attack the humans and carry the men off in a hollow log.
  • The punch monkeys communicate by punching each other. Guy knows how to communicate and punches the monkeys and gets punched in return.
  • Grug and Phil have a wrestling fight. Grug pulls Phil's clothes off leaving him in just his underwear.
  • The monster ape is about to eat Guy and the others, but they are saved in time.

Material that may scare or disturb children

Under fiveinfo

Children under five are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations.

In addition to the above-mentioned violent scenes, there are some scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children under the age of five, including the following:

  • There are several scary images in this movie such as:
    • Guy disguising himself as a rhino with tusks.
    • Guy and Eep travel through volcanic mountains which are on fire.
    • The Croods keep a pet sabre-tooth tiger which growls and looks quite fierce.
    • The chief monkey is a strange looking creature with a long beard.
    • Wolf spiders who are wolves with spider legs and many eyes.
    • The monkey cave is quite scary, very dark and red fire everywhere.
    • The monster ape is a very scary looking creature with huge teeth.

Aged five to eightinfo

Children aged five to eight will also be frightened by scary visual images and will also be disturbed by depictions of the death of a parent, a child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters.

In addition to the above-mentioned violent scenes and scary visual images, there are some scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children aged five to eight, including the following:

  • Guy is seen alone, remembering his parents as they called out to him while sinking into tar pits. Guy is crying and sad.
  • Guy and Eep kiss and appear to get electrocuted.
  • Gran is quite a scary looking character with wild eyes and is toothless.
  • On one occasion when they're preparing to fight, Gran says, “'today is a good day to die”.
  • Grug tries to grab a banana when large chickens appear and screech at them. They are all caught in a trap, hanging from a tree.
  • Eep shows Dawn all her scars, including several bites from her baby sister, and she has also lost her big toe.
  • Eep and Guy are flying on the tiger through a swarm of large dragon flies, which look pretty at first, but then the dragon flies start hitting them. They then crash into huge beehives and get caught in a web.
  • Phil tries to hypnotise Grug into agreeing to his plan for Dawn and Guy. Grug sees Phil's head floating around his own head.
  • Dawn is stung by a bee and her hand blows up like a balloon.
  • Phil's face looks quite evil at times.
  • The Betterman's wall starts to shake and they are all terrified and fearful of a monster. When the wall collapses a small monkey is there, however, the monkey has an army behind him whose eyes are all lit up.
  • The families go in search of the men and have to cross a shark infested river.
  • Guy and the men are seen tied together. They are going to be sacrificed to the banana monster.
  • Gran's hair catches on fire.
  • A monster’s hand appears on a couple of occasions and then we see that this belongs to a huge ape creature who is quite terrifying.

Aged eight to thirteeninfo

Children aged eight to thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic threats and dangers, violence or threat of violence and / or stories in which children are hurt or threatened.

  • Nothing further of concern.

Product placement

  • None noted.

Sexual references

There are some sexual references in this movie, including:

  • Guy and Eep are attracted to each other and there is much flirting. They cuddle and kiss on several occasions.

Nudity and sexual activity

  • None noted.

Use of substances

There is some use of substances in this movie, including:

  • Phil drinks a cocktail in a sauna.
  • Dawn appears to be 'high' on bee venom and acts weirdly.

Coarse language

There is some coarse language in this movie, including:

  • Name calling such as:
    • Idiot
    • Smarty pants.

In a nutshell

The Croods: A New Age is an animated movie set in prehistoric times. The cave people are often in peril and their lives are all about survival and finding food. As such, there is a lot of comic violence, however, some of the scenes are quite intense and scary. There are also several scary looking creatures. The movie is therefore not suitable for children under 6 and parental guidance is recommended for children aged 6 – 7 years old.

The main messages from this movie are that we are stronger when we work as a group and that we shouldn't fear people who are different.

Values in this movie that parents may wish to reinforce with their children include:

  • Teamwork.
  • Strong female characters (who rescue the men).
  • Acceptance of different lifestyles.
  • To look at the world through a different perspective.

This movie could also give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children attitudes and behaviours, and their real-life consequences, such as:

  • The movie compares the difference between societies who work for the common good and those who promote individuality. This would be an interesting topic to discuss with children.