International Cinema Festival of India

I understand some of you might scoff at movie studios that bother with comic book adaptations or mindless sequels, but let me tell you how much a trite sequel like Brother Bear 2 made at the box office. It made well over $250 million worldwide. How does that fair in today’s box office? It fairs well — it means this sad sequel did marginally better than the first installment.

Is this surprising? Well, given its competition of late, it’s not really that surprising. When compared to claptrap like Treasure Planet or Bolt Brother Bear 2 seems like a Faulkner short story. When our collective standards drop every decade or so, shows like the Hollywood Squares somehow manage to get a rebirth.

Such is the case when it comes to sequels. The party line coming out studios like Disney usually has something to do with “completing the original story” or bringing a popular world back to life. Invariably, it’s just nonsense. Projects don’t get green-lit for artistic reasons. They get green-lit and millions of dollars because they have a shot at making beau coup money.

Instead of delving into the meat and bone of the sequel’s story, suffice it to say it’s some convoluted story that has little to do with the first installment. So much for artistic rediscovery or whatever it is that comes out of the mouths of polished producers on the “Behind the Scene” bonus material. No, this was made to make money. And, as a tired parent, you’ll let your kids watch it because you think Disney has some integrity.

Wrong. Disney is a business. Uncle Walt is dead and gone and what remains is an apparatus so complex, so polished and perfectly perched on our collective American psyche, that we’ll bite when the bait is dangled. The MPAA is a rubber stamp and films that have no business being screen to small children are touted as family entertainment.

Don’t make the mistake of expecting too much from Brother Bear 2, then order it and enjoy it.