Earl Dablio Hernan June 17, 2016

BS ChE 3 English 41 A

Comparative Analysis: The Lorax & The White Bird

Comparing the movie The Lorax and the essay The White Bird is quite a difficult task for
me for I am not that good in analysis of literatures. But as I watched the movie again and re
read the essay, I was able to pinpoint three similarities. First was that both has a character of
Complex Simplicity. Complex Simplicity for me is that it is so simple yet some it is difficult to
understand. The movie has a very simple plot which you can easily see as the movie went by so
as with the essay which has three simple objectives which is written before the essay proper. But
despite their simplicity in terms of their technicalities, you can never really grasp it in just one read
or view. The movies main point is to portray the very importance of nature most especially trees
but for most of the viewers it is not just that. There are few other questions that arised from me
while watching the movie and a few of them are Why arent most of the people in Thneedville
curious on what is beyond the wall for one of the very essence of humanity is curiosity?, How
can no one in Thneedville came to the authorities about the worsening of the fog in order to find
the main cause of it? and many other questions that was never answered by the movie. And in
the case of the essay, I didnt fully grasp its meaning and it pave the way for me to do some
research about it and it didnt help me either. Though the objective of John Berger is so simple
but how he composed it is arduous to see the points of the objectives in the composition.
Second, in contrast to my first point, The Lorax & The literal White Bird that John Berger
describe in the first few parts of the essay are the ultimate representation of what Leonardo da
Vinci wrote which is Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. Both of them are pure embodiments
of the quote of da Vinci. The Loraxs very essence is simple that even kids can see what the
movie wants to illustrate to the viewers mind and heart and because of it is deem beautiful to
most of the viewers eyes. And so as to the white bird in which John Berger said Yet, by their
very simplicity, they allow to categorize the qualities, which make them pleasing and mysterious
to everyone who sees them.
Last is that both are describing & illustrating aesthetic emotion towards nature through the
use of figurative representation. In the movie The Lorax, the image of the cut down trees is a
derivative of how we feel towards nature which is comparable to our current situation. While in
the essay, Berger uses the white bird as the figurative representation of our emotion before
nature. He said that The white bird is an attempt to translate a message received from a real
bird which meant that the literal white bird transcends his physical implications.