Movies & TV

The movie is WAY too fucking soft on the Once-ler and humanizes him in ways that the book never did. It really ruins the whole thing, because it creates a bypolar message that if you just don't listen to the corrupting influences (the Once-ler extended family), then maybe none of this would have happened to begin with. Making a movie out of The Lorax is a hard task and should probably prompt the question "Should we make a movie out of The Lorax?" But hey, business is business, you know? The book is very critical of the nature of business; it's very explicit that the Once-ler isn't concerned about the impact he's causing until everything is burned to the ground and he's lived in the waste. The movie pitches the Once-ler as a plucky runt, a black sheep of the family, a entrepid entrapanuer who is just trying to get his idea into the world. All he wants to do, his only motivation in the movie, is to prove his family wrong, and show that he can actually amount to something. In the end, it's his family that inspires his greed. He betrays the Lorax to retain the love and adoration of his mother, brothers, and uncle, only to lose it anyway when the cash flow dries up. He's become fully sympathetic, and the thing he is most sad about is breaking his promise to the Lorax.

When you contrast him against the other villain in the film, the person selling people air, he doesn't seem so bad at all. I mean, he just wanted to sell a nice sweater and was caught up with interpersonal drama, and that's the only reason he cut down all the trees. Not because businesses must grow, not because business inherently demands a shortsighted perspective. The book has a strong message: This is what businesses do, and unless someone speaks for the trees, this is going to happen over and over again. It causes so much damage that even the capitalists can't ultimately escape. The movie, however, is different. The movie tells us that some capitalists are just plucky little guys who could do the right thing and sometimes don't, who try to make good or useful things even though it might have harm to the environment, while others only exist to exploit you and the things you need to live. The reality is that all capitalists exploit the things you need to live because man does not exist outside of nature.