What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that, for a kids' film, this one features prominent and repeated images of mayhem. Its opening sequence, which shows citizens running around in a panic and screaming, is somewhat frantic; it might be a bit too intense for some sensitive younger viewers. While much of the action is benign and cartoonish (crowds in a panic, animal children playing aggressive dodgeball or baseball and falling from windows), the film ends up with an alien invasion, with giant tripods and creatures inspired by War of the Worlds, and some potentially scary Predator or Aliens style music. One character is readable as "gay," as he adores disco and cowers before his mother, and another, a tough, baseball-playing female fox, is transformed into a traditional girly-girl, as a partly jokey reinforcement of traditional gender roles.
- Families can talk about the relationship between the father and son, as Chicken Little wants so desperately to please his dad. How might his father show more faith in his son, rather than expecting the worst? How might Chicken Little trust his father to appreciate his own interests and identity, rather than trying so hard to be the son he imagines his father "wants" (that is, a baseball player like his father was)?