| 8+ Cautions: some violence and intensity, some filial disobedience and sibling rivalry, and some sensuality and mild immodesty
Swiss Family Robinson is a light family film with a classic Disney combination of dangerous adventures and happy endings. Aside from a couple of potentially annoying characters and a realistic but unfortunate amount of sibling rivalry, Swiss Family Robinson is a fun and life-like picture of real family relationships as experienced on an unusually bountiful deserted island in the South Seas.
1960 | Ken Annakin | 126 min Watch Trailer
Some Violence and Intensity
Pirates attack, chase and fight the good guys, including the women, with swords and pistols. One pirate stabs another, but nothing is shown. Good guys fight the pirates with guns, crossbows, bombs and falling rocks and logs.
An anaconda nearly kills one character by choking him and pulling him underwater. The other animals such as tigers, sharks and iguanas may also frighten younger children. Two dogs fight a tiger, but are not harmed.
There is a shipwreck.
Some Filial Disobedience and Sibling Rivalry
The youngest son whines, disobeys, argues with and ignores his elders. He is not exactly negatively-portrayed, but as a character he is potentially annoying enough to discourage imitation.
The older two boys fight, verbally and physically. However, the movie ends with them on good terms.
Some Sensuality and Mild Immodesty
A girl, enjoying the attention, flirts with both of the older boys, and (possibly deliberately) poisons their relationship. She asks one of them to teach her to shoot, just so that he will have to put his arm around her, and turns out to have already known very well how to shoot. The boys fight for turns dancing a polka with her. She and one of the boys kiss a number of times.
The parents embrace a few times.
The older boys talk about hoping they will meet girls when they get off the island, and reminisce about being in the city and seeing “all the girls stroll past, all dressed up.”
Men go shirtless several times throughout the movie.
Spoiler Warning - A side character is initially thought to be a boy, but turns out to be a girl in disguise, because of the pirates. Before they discover that she’s a girl, the two older boys tell “him” that “he” can sleep between them, and that “he” should take his clothes off before crossing a river (she doesn’t do either).
Note:
The mother initially disapproves of the treehouse design, and tells her husband she will not live there. However, after the house is finished, she sees that his plan was a good one, and the two are reconciled.
After unusual blessings in a dangerous situation, the father says, “I wouldn’t dare pray for any more miracles. Not in one day.” Someone says they are “lucky” to have something. A dead man is referenced with a “God rest his soul.”
One of the boys says, “I want to be something in the world. That’s why I want to go to school,” and eventually goes to a university. However, this is not shown to be the only, or even the best way to “be something.”
Homer’s Iliad is quoted and referenced positively.
Christmas is celebrated, and the song “O Christmas Tree” is sung. Alcohol is consumed in moderation. The little boy is also given a taste.
The father’s phrase “no limit to what a man can do” is meant hyperbolically.
