Don't Give a HootI noticed the trailer for the upcoming film Hoot while watching United 93. It certainly looked like
a "message" movie in support of eco-terrorism.
Three middle school children band together, sabotage a construction site, gag a land developer and take him hostage. But their criminal conduct, aimed at saving the habitat of burrowing owls from "greedy land developers" isn't reality-based.The message seems to be reaching the intended (younsters and adolescents) market:
"If it's a really, really good cause and you aren't like really hurting someone, it's sort of like it works out okay," responded 12-year old Alex Kacher, when asked by Cybercast News Service whether he was troubled by the kids' criminal behavior in the movie.
A seven-year-old girl who identified herself as Dillon noted that "it was a fun movie" and said she learned that "it's not good to kill animals."Hiaasen's environmentally themed novels have drawn critical praise and earned him fans like former Vice President Al Gore. Many members of the extremist group Earth First are also fans of Hiaasen's novels, according to the Palm Beach Post. Hiaasen's 2005 novel "Flush" sympathetically portrays a man who sinks a casino boat that is illegally dumping sewage into the ocean.The good news is that kids hate "message" movies even more than adults do, so expect them to avoid this movie like the plague.