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Story

The Secret Life of Pets is about what pets do when their owners leave for work for the day: they spend the day meeting their friends, having heavy rock parties, raiding the fridge and watching television.

The main character is Max (voice of Louis C.K.). He’s a loveable, friendly dog whose happy life with his owner, Katie (Ellie Kemper), is turned upside down when she brings home Duke (Eric Stonestreet) as a ‘brother’ for Max. Duke is a huge dog who threatens Max’s comfortable life. Max decides to trash Katie’s apartment and blame Duke, so that Katie will get rid of Duke.

Before Max can put his plan into action, he and Duke go for a walk and end up in a lot of trouble. They get ambushed by a gang of scrawny cats, ‘arrested’ by the dog catchers and set free by an angry rabbit called Snowball. They end up in an underworld of lost and unwanted pets who want to destroy humans. Max and Duke must escape, find their way home and learn some valuable lessons on the way.

Themes

Sibling rivalry; blended families; animals in danger.

Violence

The Secret Life of Pets has a lot of slapstick violence. For example:

  • Characters are continually crashing into each other or objects, falling down or being tossed in the air.
  • Animals drive vehicles that go all over the road and crash into other vehicles. One time the animals make a bus go over a bridge, where it hangs for some time before falling into a river.

The Secret Life of Pets also has more serious violence. For example:

  • Duke sits on Max, pushing him out of his bed. They get into a fight. Duke grabs Max by his lead and pulls him along the street. Max crashes into cars and ends up in a rubbish bin.
  • Some stray cats surround Duke and Max and attack them.
  • Some dogs attack the dog collector’s van and its driver.
  • Snowball stamps on a snake to gain entrance to the underworld.
  • Max and Duke have to pretend to be ‘owner killers’ to be accepted into the underworld.
  • Gidget (a Chihuahua who’s in love with Max) jumps on a cat and repeatedly hits him until he tells her where Max is.
  • A huge python tries to bite Max but is crushed by falling bricks. All the underworld animals then attack Max and Duke and chase them through the sewers.
  • A fight breaks out between Gidget and her friends and the underworld gang.

Sexual references

The Secret Life of Pets has some sexual references. For example, Gidget is in love with Max and constantly refers to him as the good-looking dog. She also watches romantic soapies on television.

Alcohol, drugs and other substances

The Secret Life of Pets shows some use of substances, including when Max and Duke seem to get ‘high’ on a feast of sausages.

Nudity and sexual activity

None of concern

Product placement

The following products are displayed or used in The Secret Life of Pets: YouTube.

Coarse language

The Secret Life of Pets has a lot of name-calling that children might copy.

Ideas to discuss with your children

The Secret Life of Pets is a comic adventure story about the life of pets when their owners aren’t around.

The movie is fast paced and original and does have some good underlying messages, but it is also full of violence and quite scary for younger children. Therefore it’s more suited to older viewers, and we recommend parental guidance for children aged 8-10 years.

These are the main messages from this movie:

  • Change is often difficult at first but can bring many rewards.
  • We should try to understand others rather than rejecting them.

Values in this movie that you could reinforce with your children include determination, the friendship, cooperation, loyalty and openness to new things and ideas.

This movie could also give you the chance to talk with your children about real-life issues like these:

  • Can you get what you want without meeting violence with violence?
  • Does revenge serve any purpose other than to make the avenger feel better?

Supported By

  • Department of Social Services

Raising Children Network is supported by the Australian Government. Member organisations are the Parenting Research Centre and the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute with The Royal Children’s Hospital Centre for Community Child Health.

Member Organisations

  • Parenting Research Centre
  • The Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne
  • Murdoch Children's Research Institute

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