Story
Finding Dory takes us back to the colourful undersea world of Finding Nemo. This new movie tells the story of Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), a Pacific Regal Blue Tang fish with short-term memory loss, who loses her family and goes on an exciting adventure to find them.
Dory is happy living with her friend Marlin (Albert Brooks) and his son Nemo (Hayden Rolence) in a safe community on the Great Barrier Reef. Although she has short-term memory loss, she sometimes remembers snippets of life with her mother and father. One day, when out on a school excursion, Dory is swept away by a swift current and is thrown to the ground. The fall jolts her memory and she remembers where her mother and father live. She immediately convinces Marlin and Nemo to accompany her in the search for her long-lost family.
The search brings them to the Monterey Marine Life Institute in California. They become separated. While Dory is trying to find her parents, Nemo and Marlin try to find Dory. Her new friends, Hank the octopus (Ed O’Neill), Destiny the whale shark (Kaitlin Olson) and Bailey the Beluga whale (Ty Burrell), help Dory in her search.
As Dory’s memories about her past and the separation from her parents return to her, she uses her memories and her instincts to find her mother and father. She must then try to reunite with Marlin and Nemo. To do this she enlists the help of her parents and her new friends.
Themes
Separation from family and loss of loved ones; death; living with a disability or something that makes you different; dealing with traumatic events or memories from the past; trusting your instincts
Violence
Finding Dory includes some scenes of slapstick violence as well as scenes where sea creatures are threatened by larger predators or humans. For example:
Sexual references
Finding Dory has one mild sexual reference. Dory is working as a teaching assistant and she briefly expresses surprise that she might need to give the young fish a talk about reproduction. This is a subtle reference, and young children probably won’t understand it. The joke is directed more at adult audience members.
Alcohol, drugs and other substances
None of concern
Nudity and sexual activity
None of concern
Product placement
There is no product placement of concern in Finding Dory, but a lot of merchandise associated with the movie is available.
Coarse language
Finding Dory has some mild teasing, but it doesn’t include name-calling. There are also some substitute swear words, but young children are unlikely to copy them.
Ideas to discuss with your children
Finding Dory is a beautiful animated adventure movie with some powerful positive messages that you can talk about with children. It is entertaining and fun for adults as well as children.
The movie does have themes of parental loss and separation and some scary scenes, which younger children might find very frightening. Therefore it isn’t recommended for children under 6 years, and we recommend parental guidance for children aged 6-8 years. You could also talk about some of the movie’s themes with children aged over 8 years.
The main messages from this movie are:
- People who live with disability can overcome difficulties and follow their dreams.
- Friends and family are important to wellbeing.
- Sometimes you have to be brave and face up to past fears so you can overcome them.
- It’s important to trust in your own instincts.
Values in this movie that you could reinforce with your children include self-belief and determination, loyalty and friendship, and bravery.
You could also talk about how animals in captivity are treated and what the movie says about this.