The Smurfs 2: Movie Review

There’s a perennial problem that high school English teachers delight to put before students: are we who we are because of biology or sociology? Does our make-up have more to do with our genes or the influence of those around us? In short which is more powerful, nature or nurture? As unlikely as it sounds, Columbia Pictures is posing that question to pre-schoolers with the release of The Smurfs 2.

The second film to bring cartoonist Peyo’s little blue sprites to the screen picks up where the first left off. Papa Smurf and his big blue family are back in the Hidden Forest, preparing a birthday surprise for Smurfette. The evil wizard Gargamel is still marooned in New York, but he’s managed to put his skills to good use by becoming an internationally celebrated stage magician. He’s also been hard at work creating two new minions called Vexy and Hackus, ‘Naughties’ who are Smurf-like in appearance but not in nature. If Gargamel can use them to get his hands on Smurfette, he’ll be one step closer to discovering the secret formula Papa Smurf used to turn her into a real Smurf. Then he can manufacture as many of the little blue creatures as he likes, and milk them of their magical essence. But Gargamel’s whole plan hangs on whether Vexy and Hackus are naughty by nature, or can be taught to be nice.

It’s admittedly a plot the average parent will struggle to stay awake in. However, The Smurfs 2 aims to keep an older audience interested by including some content for the adults. There’s a subplot going on between Patrick, the Smurf’s human friend, and his stepfather that questions how we relate to our own parents. But personally I could have done without smurfisms like, “Holy Smurf!”, “Right in the smurf-berries!” and most of all, “Whoah! That was ducked up!” - when Gargamel turns Patrick’s dad into a mallard. Here’s hoping none of those phrases are picked up by your ankle-biters.

The power of choice

However, The Smurfs 2 has a lot to say about the blessings of family, especially in a society where an increasing number of children live in blended homes. Stepdads like Patrick’s father and Papa Smurf are given big points for ‘showing up’ even if they sometimes get things wrong. That’s because choice is the strongest moral force in the universe. As Papa Smurf assures Smurfette:

Every year I tell you the same thing: it doesn’t matter where you came from, it’s who you choose to be that matters.

And true to form, Vexy and Hackus’ lives change when they choose to be different. But as a wise parent once advised me, never teach a child something they will later have to unlearn. The truth is, our children will soon discover that their decisions to be good don’t always carry them very far. The sin that every human struggles against goes deeper than our determination can reach. Much better to point them towards God who has the power to make the changes we long for. His rescue begins not with a renovation but a new creation:

I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 11:19)

Watching The Smurfs 2 with your kids

When talking through films with kids, it’s best to keep the questions simple and straight to the point:

• Can you make yourself good, just by choosing to be good?
• What stops you being the person you want to be?
• Who can do something about the habits you just can’t break?

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