Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia

This topic contains:

• overall comments and recommendations
• details about Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia's classification and consumer advice lines
• a review of Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagoniacompleted by Young Media Australia (YMA) on 8 June 2007.

Overall comments and recommendations

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) and the associated consumer advice lines.

YMA review

This review of the movie Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia contains the following information:

• a synopsis of the story
• themes
• use of violence
• material that may scare children
• product placement
• sexual references
• nudity and sexual activity
• use of substances
• coarse language
• the movie's message

A synopsis of the story

This is not a fictional movie but rather a documentary featuring a world renowned Argentinean palaeontologist, Professor Rodolfo Coria, who traces the history of the dinosaurs in his home country of Argentina. These dinosaurs are some of the largest to be discovered. They are the plant-eating Argentinosaur, and the Giganotosaur, a bipedal carnivore, that is virtually the same size as the Tyrannosaurus Rex. Real life exploration, alternates with CGI examples of how the dinosaurs, ate, hunted and travelled throughout the land as it was then. The film also shows how the arrival of a comet caused the species to die out. There are examples of what needs to be done to classify and place dinosaur bones in a museum.

Themes

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.

None of concern

Use of violence

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.

The only violence in this film happens when the dinosaurs chase and attack one another.  These images are in 3D and as a result are very realistic and they seem to be walking into you or else running at you. The sound effects are loud, so some of the time it feels as if they are thumping over you.

Material that may scare children

Under eight

Children under eight are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations, the death of a parent or child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters.

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, and some children between five and eight, including the following:

• As stated previously the CGI images are very large and some of the time it appears as if the dinosaurs were leaning towards you and are about to eat you. This, along with the loud sound effects, may scare small children.

Aged over eight

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. 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.

Children over 8 are unlikely to be disturbed by this film

Product placement

None

Sexual references

None

Nudity and sexual activity

None

Use of substances

None

Coarse language

None

The movie's message

Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia is an Imax documentary featuring real footage of the sites of fossil finds in Patagonia as well as computer generated recreations of the dinosaurs. It will be particularly interesting to children over 5 who are interested in dinosaurs.