While watching Disney/Pixar’s film Monster’s Inc. one is amused by the premise of a world of monsters that are afraid of small human children. We as viewers are titillated by the inversion of traditional fantasy tropes that pit children against unknown horrors and relish in the contemporary feel of such an idea. Yet we are also taken aback by the absurdity of such a situation in which we instill fear in the creatures of our nightmares and question what we possess that could do such a thing. The answer, of course, is a very simple one: difference. The monsters in the film are terrified of children because they make presumptions based on difference that shape their notions of the children and their capabilities; the terror this deed creates is only counteracted by the engaged obtainment of knowledge. Thus Monsters Inc. functions not only as an animated children’s film but as a narrative of burgeoning multicultural enlightenment and acceptance.
At the film’s start the inhabitants of Monstropolis, the aptly named reality in which the monsters dwell, are horridly xenophobic. They believe human children to be deadly, toxic upon the slightest touch. Like overseers on a cotton plantation or present-day rural farmers the monsters exploit children for their resources—here screams that fuel the entirety of the city rather than menial hard labor—while simultaneously removing themselves from any connection with them. The monsters punish those who (even unknowingly) associate with children by calling a 2319, an announcement that alerts the Child Detection Agency and results in horrible treatment of colleagues and close friends, or banishing the perpetrators to the human world. This form of “othering” based on inter-species domination and interaction mirrors that of non-white and non-First World individuals in postmodern society: an example being the current furor over the border between the United States and Mexico based on “patriotic” ideals of citizenship that exclude the millions of dollars owed to illegal, unskilled immigrant workers. This policy of prohibition changes when Boo, with the characteristic intuition of an infant, enters Monstropolis and, through her actions, teaches Sulley, Mike and the other monsters the value of proper cultural exchange.
Though initially apprehensive about contact with Boo Sulley (played by John Goodman) begins to warm to the little girl after a hectic day of touting her around the titular business. Forgetting the stigma of his culture he plays hide-and-seek with the small girl, for which he is reprimanded by his best friend Mike (Billy Crystal), frets about her disappearance and mourns her perceived death by garbage compactor. Sulley even becomes so attached to Boo, following the realization that her difference is not harmful, that he treks back to Monster Inc. headquarters after his banishment to save her from serving as lab rat for an experiment aimed at raising decreasing scream efficiency. Although it takes slightly longer Mike too has the revelation that children are not harmful and should be protected and together the two attempt a rescue of Boo, during which they travel through multiple foreign locations in the human world (a slight nod at the importance of multiculturalism in the film). The two also make an important discovery whilst harboring the child and undergoing her rescue: that laughter, generated by joyful rather than terrifying dealings between both species, is infinitely more powerful than screams. This finding revolutionizes the power industry in the world and creates a solid reciprocal relationship between the two realms absent of prejudice and fear. In its narrative Monsters Inc. exudes the message that whether you are a normative example of human child or green with one eye everyone should be fully embraced for who they are. Through this understanding of the necessity and power of difference alliances can be constructed and all included, whether “monster” or “human,” can benefit from open and delightful multicultural experiences.
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