Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy

image for Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy

Short takes

Parental guidance recommended under 6 (Scary scenes)

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This topic contains:

  • overall comments and recommendations
  • details of classification and consumer advice lines for Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy
  • a review of Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 1 July 2014.

Overall comments and recommendations

Children under 6 Parental guidance recommended due to some scary scenes
Children aged 6 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: Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy
Classification: G
Consumer advice lines: None
Length: 78 minutes

ACCM review

This review of the movie contains the following information:

A synopsis of the story

Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy is an animated film that follows the story of Zarina (voice of Christina Hendricks), an intelligent and inquisitive pixie dust-keeper fairy. Zarina had always been amazed by the magical qualities of pixie dust, and became determined to discover everything that it could do. However, after experimenting with blue pixie dust and causing an incident in Pixie Hollow, she is forced to leave her home to continue her experiments elsewhere.

A year later during the Four Seasons Festival, the pixies notice Zarina flying around the audience and creating poppies which put everyone to sleep. She heads to the dust depot and steals the blue pixie dust – without it, the fairies cannot multiply the yellow dust and continue to fly. After Zarina takes off, the other fairies set off in search of her.

The fairies discover that Zarina has taken control of a pirate ship, working as their captain and promising the crew that she will be able to make their ship fly using the fairy dust. However, things go wrong for Zarina, and James Hook (Tom Hiddleston) turns on her and takes back the ship. It is then up to Zarina’s friends to rescue her, and to get back the fairy dust that belongs to Pixie Hollow.

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.

Friendship; power; good versus evil; fairies and pirates

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 limited violence in the film, including:

  • A baby crocodile repeatedly bites a pirate’s leg and buttocks.
  • A swordfight between pirates and fairies ends with all of the fairies being trapped.

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:

  • Children this age may be scared by the pirates.
  • The fairy Zarina is banished from Pixie Hollow after her experiments with pixie dust go wrong. After this, James turns on her and traps her inside a lamp, proceeding to toss her into the ocean to drown. She is saved by the other fairies, however.  

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.

Younger children in this group may be worried by what happens to Zarina.

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 of concern

Thirteen and overinfo

Children over the age of thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic physical harm or threats, molestation or sexual assault and / or threats from aliens or the occult.

Nothing of concern

Product placement

The following products are displayed or used in this movie:

  • Nothing of concern in the film, but associated merchandise available.

Sexual references

None of concern

Nudity and sexual activity

None of concern

Use of substances

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

  • The pirates are seen to be drinking alcohol at one point.

Coarse language

None of concern

In a nutshell

Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy is a film that talks about the choices and different paths individuals may take in life. It demonstrates that it can be dangerous to place one’s trust in strangers, and also highlights the importance of having trusted people in your life to guide you in making good choices. Additionally, the film depicts the strength of friendship as well as the necessity of forgiveness, and how both are needed in order for relationships to grow. The film is probably of most interest to children aged ten and under, but under sixes may need parent help with some scenes that they may find scary.

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

  • Feeling free to be different, irrespective of the responses of others.
  • The importance of curiosity and trying new things.
  • Forgiveness and understanding that people can be basically good while still occasionally behaving badly or being misguided by others.

Parents may also wish to talk about the difficulties of always following rules and the importance of not always trusting strangers.