Monday, October 4, 2010

REAL Adoption

Last week Ev and I headed out for a good, old fashioned Girl's Day Out. Part of what we did was seeing a movie at the dollar theater. We saw Despicable Me and, while it was completely enjoyable on many levels,  it was touch and go there for a bit.
There is an adoption theme in the movie and it makes me wonder, when can people get this right?
Has anyone else seen this movie?
I don't think I am being too sensitive here. There were just things that I did not like and then, all of the sudden I was able to understand how wrong adoption can be, if we, as adoptive parents aren't careful.
There were these 3 sisters in the movie and they were "orphans" and they lived in a girls' home. They were forced to walk the streets selling cookies to earn their keep. When the one girl showed her quirky personality, the house mother said, " you know that no one will ever adopt you right?". Then the main character decides to adopt the girls so he can use them to further his evil plan, he needs them for his own selfish reasons and just picks them up. When he is done with them, even though he is starting to feel for them, he gives them back, he un- adopts them. They are heart broken and return to the girl's home where they are expected to re-assume their life there.  But wait! Now he misses them and goes to get them back and ultimately has to save them from his nemesis. The movie ends with the main character kissing the girls's good night for the first time.
I understand why this movie was written the way it was. There was a plot they had to get through and they just did it in the easiest way possible. There was never any mention of the birth parents or their fate or why these girls are on their own. The girls were picked up, returned, at everyone else's whim. It was truly an awful presentation on adoption.
I worried the whole movie about what Ev was thinking. I didn't want to get up and leave for fear of turning it into this huge issue. After the movie I tried in a gentle way to talk to Ev about it. We talked about the funny things, the yellow dudes, the moon shrinkage. Eventually I said " I did enjoy the movie but I wish they had done a better job talking about adoption" Ev replied "Oh like when he gave the girls back?" I told her yes, that was mostly the thing I was talking about. Her response was " Mama it's just a movie, and not even a REAL movie, just a silly movie about silly things, it's not like they were talking about REAL adoption."
And then we went on with the day, I let it go because she could. I realized we must be getting something right. Or she is.

1 comment:

Tara said...

we saw the movie too and I was also bothered by that story line. I got a little choked up and Lilly also said, "Mom, its just a movie". Gotta love kids! I bet that was uncomfortable for you guys. Sounds like you did exactly the right thing by opening the dialogue.