Alike: A Short Film On The Importance Of Creativity – Parenthood

Alike is an animated short that everyone should see. In fact, he has won countless awards, including the Goya Award for Best Animated Short Film in 2016.

These great recognitions are due to the excellent way its creators, Rafa Cano Méndez and Daniel Martínez Lara, describe the importance of creativity and how it gets lost over the years due to a monotonous and dull society.

In this article, we will briefly summarize this wonderful video for you. But to appreciate and understand it, you absolutely have to look at it. Haven’t you seen it yet? What are you waiting for?

What is creativity?

Before we talk about the importance of creativity, we need to know what this concept is all about. Thus, according to psychologist Joy Paul Guilford, being creative implies the presence of the following three skills:

• Fluency : the ability to find a wide range of solutions to the same problem.
• Flexibility : ability to see situations from different angles and to come up with solutions that are different from each other.
• Originality : to think differently and in an unusual way.

In fact, Howard Gardner, the creator of the theory of multiple intelligences, postulates that each of the eight intelligences expresses creativity in itself. Therefore, it is essential for the correct cognitive development of children, so it is important to allow and encourage the little ones to express their imaginations through:

• The music
• The painting
• The game
• Dance
• Writing
• Handicrafts
• Theater

Alike : a short film on the importance of creativity

Alike shows us the grim reality by depicting, in a graphic way, a sad and boring society in which the citizens simply conform to daily life and established routine. The little protagonist of the story tries not to follow this gray and monotonous life, but his way of understanding the world does not match that of others.

Thus, his creativity is penalized and punished until he loses hope and illusion, accepts the rules and becomes one more member of the herd. Fortunately, the father of this child realizes what is happening: his son is not as full of life and joy as before.

For this reason, he brings a solution to this serious problem, so that the child sees that it is necessary to be creative to enjoy a life full of colors, teaching him that he must follow this path to enjoy happiness.

Conclusions after viewing the short film Alike

Through this short film we can conclude that as mothers, fathers and educators, we have a duty not to let children’s creativity die, so that teachers ensure that school attendance is not just about develop academic skills, but also creative, social, emotional, etc.

Likewise, at home, children of all ages should have the freedom to express their thoughts and ideas through art and imagination. Therefore, we must prevent children from losing their essence and identity. We have to assume that each person is different, which is rewarding and necessary to achieve a healthy and balanced society, because a world without creativity is a miserable and useless world.