Thursday, May 20, 2010

Kung-Fu Panda, I ((heart)) You

Jack is home sick today.  He spent the entire night throwing up.  And I do mean ALL NIGHT.  He first threw up at 10:45 PM, and proceeded to the final up-chuck at 5:50 AM.  Needless to say, we are both pretty exhausted today.  So it's been a movie day.  After some time with PBS, we watched "Spirit, Stallion of the Cimmaron" which is good- my kids love horses and all that, but it IS like one long Bryan Adams video montage.

Then we watched "Kung-Fu Panda".  We've watched it a billion times, but not for a while.  I have to say I was moved to a whole new level of appreciation for this movie today.  I've always liked it; I love the idea of "there is no secret ingredient" meaning: what you need you already have.  Or as Bono puts it: "What you don't have you don't need it now / What you don't know you can feel somehow" or "What you've got they can't steal it / No, they can't even feel it."  But I digress...

What really moved me about this movie this time around was the way they handled the Panda's adoption.  It's obvious from very early on in the movie that Jack Black's character (Po) is adopted- his father is a Goose, for heaven's sake.  But they don't make a big deal about it.  They never tell us the story of how Po got to be in a goose family, but yet we see them as a family for sure.  It's not treated as unusual at all.  None of the other characters act like it's weird for a goose to parent a panda- it's just accepted!  Beautiful.  And just when we think that Papa Goose is going to tell the Po some version of, "You aren't really my son..." he doesn't!  Instead he tells him the secret of the famous noodle soup!  Which leads us all to believe that there is a great understanding between them of how they became a family, and maybe it is none of our business.  We get to assume that no matter how Po got into this family, his is IN this family.  That goose is his DAD and a proud Dad he is!

I love the scene where Papa Goose is jumping up and down telling everyone that the Dragon Warrior is HIS SON!  So sweet.  Such pride.

Reminds me of the slogan on a great T-shirt one of my FB friends is selling to raise money for their Ethiopian adoption:

Love is not a color.

Nor is it a species.  ;-)

5 comments:

Unknown said...

I just LOVE you!

Heidi Jo Comes said...

funny how we can find such deep meanings in disney....especially when we're totally sleep deprived :o)

just kidding! i love that show too, it does have a wonderful message!

Robyn said...

my kiddos haven't seen this yet, but it sounds like a good one!

question for you: i saw on eryn's blog that you sent a care pkg to abiey--has he requested certain items or did you just send things you knew he would like? we had him as our driver too and are wanting to send him and the girls at the bejoe a care pkg. we totally want to copy you :)

any help would be great! my email is robynmaner@hotmail.com

Laura Ferry-Jimenez said...

we submitted paperwork to Gladney and are in beyond early stages of our Ethiopian adoption. one of my ideas was a fundraiser tee based on a Mother Theresa quote - loves sees no color. I was curious about the tee you mentioned. just trying to get some ideas! :)

ps: loved the singing videos!!

Margaret said...

We are also in the early stages of an adoption through Gladney as well and was wondering about the Love Is Not a Color t-shirts. We are planning a 5K fundraiser and are trying to think of a "slogan", that popped out at me, but I don't want to steal anyone's ideas! Would you be able to forward my email to your friend so that I can ask her permission? Or facebook me!

Margaret Byers
margaretbyers@email.com

Selam! G'day! Hello!