Hoodwinked

image for Hoodwinked

Short takes

Not suitable under 5; parental guidance to 6 (scary scenes)

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This topic contains:

  • overall comments and recommendations
  • details of classification and consumer advice lines for Hoodwinked
  • a review of Hoodwinked completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 5 August 2006.

Overall comments and recommendations

Children under 5 Not suitable due to scary scenes.
Children aged 5–6 Parental guidance recommended due to scary scenes.
Children aged 7 and over Ok for this age group. Furthermore, although this movie is really aimed at younger children, children over the age of thirteen would probably still find some of the scenes funny, and would also understand some of the more adult double entendres. The film also has some good messages that older children would understand.

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: Hoodwinked
Classification: G
Consumer advice lines: None
Length: 81 minutes

ACCM review

This review of the movie contains the following information:

A synopsis of the story

The story starts with the classic Red-Riding Hood scene, in which Red-Riding Hood walks into Granny’s house, the wolf jumps out at her, Red Riding hood defends herself, Granny jumps out of the cupboard and the woodcutter flies through the window with his axe to save Granny and Red-Riding Hood from the wolf.

A Police Bear turns up and it is revealed that a ‘goody bandit’ has been stealing everyone’s recipes. As Granny still has her recipes, Police Bear decides that either she, Red-Riding Hood, the wolf or the woodcutter must be guilty and is determined to find evidence to prove his theory. Detective Flipper the Frog also arrives and decides that to get to the truth, further investigation is needed. He therefore decides to sit each of them down and they all tell their stories up to that point.

In the meantime, the recipe thief makes off with Granny’s recipe book and everyone pulls together to save the forest from the thief’s dastardly plan.

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.

Crime; Fairy tales.

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 one violent scene in which helpers tie up Red Riding Hood and put her in a cable car full of dynamite.

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.

There are two scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb some children under the age of five:

  • the Police Bear shouts and behaves in a threatening manner towards the four suspects.
  • Red Riding Hood falls out of a cable car into the forest, The forest is dark and scary and she sees a pair of eyes looking at her through the bush. The eyes belong to the wolf who threatens her, then growls and chases her.

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.

  • Nothing further noted.

Product placement

  • None noted.

Sexual references

  • None noted.

Nudity and sexual activity

  • None noted.

Use of substances

  • None noted.

Coarse language

  • None noted.

In a nutshell

The main messages of Hoodwinked are that it is best not to make judgements based on appearances, and that lying can lead to a loss of trust.

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

  • telling the truth
  • tolerance
  • teamwork.

This movie could also give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children the importance of getting to know the truth before making judgements.