We have seen some incredible animation movies in recent times!
Who can forget the first few minutes of the 2015 movie – Minions? Wasn’t it hilarious when the minions try to save their Evil Masters from all perils and end up being the cause of their doom? The first few moments of The Ice age, with Scrat running to save his acorn, or The Lion King when the jungle in Africa wakes up to a mesmerizingly beautiful morning – they made us (adults) fall in love with animation movies all over again.
Minions – Kevin, Stuart and Bob
Do you love to watch animation movies?
When we grew up, we lost a few abilities. If you are like most adults you do not draw weird pictures with lots of crayons. You do not look at people with innocent eyes or trust someone without judging them first. But there is one thing many of us, grown up adults living in the very real world do, and love to do just like healthy kids! We love animation movies!
Yes. Many people with a REAL job earning millions of dollars, bossing over real people, living in a tough environment, crisp practical corporate guys and gals – love animation, maybe even shed a tear over the loss of Master ‘Shifu’ or feel glad when Rio the Blue Macau gets reunited with the tribe. What creates this anomaly? Why has this ability stayed on with us as opposed to many other things which left us with childhood?
You may say such movies make you feel like a child again, and that would be true, but that’s not all. Here are 9 reasons why full sized adults with a real life job (like me) wouldn’t mind spending a few hours of their busy lives watching animation movies which describe something bizarre and absurd, abstract and completely made up.
9 Reasons why Adults love Animation Movies
- That happy feeling – Undoubtedly the most attractive part of animation movies is that they tap our very basic need for innocent entertainment. They are usually not violent, good wins over evil and they don’t show spilling blood and guts (a necessary evil to many other movies). You can sit with your family and have a good time, watch it with your kids and laugh it off or with your spouse and deepen the bond with some naïve laughter. They will not curse, won’t show nudity and there is nothing awkward to explain if you are with a child.
Ellie the Mammoth – Ice Age - The Orwellian doublethink – When you have two very opposing ideas merging together in sync it creates attraction. Someone as evil as Gru can be innocent enough to dress up like a woman to impress his kids – a disgusting Green Ogre like Fiona can look so beautiful and be so adorable with Shrek, a gigantic Mammoth like Ellie can be soft and modest about her powers. Dracula can be loving and caring and his vampire daughter can be actually sexy. A fearful lion can be majestic Simba, the King of the Jungle who we know deserves the throne!
Dracula – Hotel Transylvania
- Nothing is impossible – The illustration used in animation movies reach a different realm altogether. Your mind becomes completely free because that is precisely how the creator is – Free to imagine. Storytelling is much easier and flexible. It’s like saying – what if I had a potato for a head! You can make up absurd jokes and laugh when you are with friends, but you cannot show them in a movie – unless it is an animation movie!There are some limits with any other movie. You can accept Chinese characters fly between trees in a Ninja movie, but you cannot accept Bruce Willis fly in ‘Die hard’! There is an opinionated part of us judging, editing, censoring and accepting things at every moment. We allow a certain leeway and accept things within the limits of reason. Every movie creates some tension, even when you enjoy it. This is more relaxed in case of animation movies. You do not engage that editor part of your brain anymore.Everything is just so much beyond reality. You accept and let go. It’s relaxing!
Blu the Macau and his family – Rio
- Love the heroism
Who did not adore Gru, the villain in Despicable me, Simba in The Lion King, Elsa in Frozen, Flik the inventive ant in Bug’s life, the big fat Panda Po in Kung-fu Panda, Blu the bird and his perfect family in Rio, Ellie the Mammoth in Ice age, the Robot Baymax in Big hero 6, Marty the zebra in Madagascar, Shrek and Fiona in Shrek or Marlin in ‘Finding Nemo’.The heroism and characterization are incredible. Animation movies have given us some amazing characters to cherish, to remember and love; they have given us certain memorable moments too – like Simba‘s scared-innocent look when Rafiki the Monkey held him up before the jungle and or when Elsa turned Anna into a block of ice in Frozen. 
Elsa – Frozen
- Inner child unleashed – Animation movies are childish, and they take us away from the frustration of adult life and from the monotony of reality. They create our perfect escape route.
Ellie the Mammoth – Ice Age
I mean come on!! What a wonderful world it would be if fishes could show human emotions, animals can talk and laugh and play, robots can make you feel sad or happy. Animation movies keep you young, as opposed to movies like Rest Stop, Saw or Hostel, which leave you with a haunting bad taste, makes you see harsh and cruel realities as if you did not have a lot of that already!
Baymax – Big Hero 6
6. Laughter, the best medicine – We all love to laugh, don’t we?
In my recently published book, The Laughter Paradigm , I have mentioned the immense benefits of laughter and having fun, and how to start feeling happy. Your brain releases endorphins which have much greater effects than to release stress. There are defined psychological and social benefits of laughter. When you watch animation movies you do not laugh at someone, you laugh with them. That’s as good as it gets.
Po the Panda – Kung fu panda
7. Watch an animation movie with your partner – My highly opinionated prescription!
A lot of compatibility issues can be found by your preferences in animation movies. It sounds a bit opinionated, I know, but if your girl or your guy does not share a good laugh with you when Scrat the squirrel tries to fetch his Acorn, there is something bigger to worry about. Get my drift?
Scrat with his acorn – Ice age
8. The grown-up perspective
Marty the Zebra – Madagascar
Animation movies bridge the gap between an adult and a child. You can sit with your kid and laugh it off, but the two of you are watching different things. You have a different perspective now. The words Sugar honey Ice Tea from Marty the Zebra in Madagascar (an acronym for not a good word) will not make sense unless you are an adult, the grandeur of the visualizations in The Lion King will not be evident unless you are mature. Even though your kid is laughing along with you, it’s not the same, believe me.
Marlin the fish – Finding Nemo
9. Electrifying visualisations and Amazing Graphics
Imagine the first scene of The Lion king – the day-break in the jungle with that amazing song and the herd of zebras and giraffes and elephants all flocking in to see their future king, the dance of the Macaws in Rio, or the chasing-scene from ‘The adventures of Tintin’. The performance of today’s graphic designers transcends to the realm of art, you cannot help but appreciate the craftsmanship when you think of the grandeur which a person simply sitting with a computer can make you feel.
Flik the Ant – Bugs life
(Thank you to The Captain’s Diaries for this great article.)
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