We know the usual perils of kids playing videogames. They'll be desensitized to violence, they won't go outside to play, and they might be encouraged to kill hookers. But what about the lack of credibility when they try to warn us about aliens?

Danish horror film The Substitute raises this issue. It's one of those movies where kids get wise to a terrible monster, but the adults simply won't believe them. It's mostly notable for Paprika Steen's funny and scary performance as an alien masquerading as a substitute teacher (pictured). But I found it curious how the movie establishes that the parents don't believe their children.

Right before the lead character discovers that the new substitute teacher is indeed an alien, he's playing what looks like Space Harrier on his cell phone. Meanwhile, a faculty member delivers the following speech to a gathering of parents:

Most kids live in a fantasy. They're addicted to their personal imaginations and they simply can't get enough. They spend hours every day starting at fascinating, fantastic fairy tale universes on video games or computer screens...In their insatiable need for peril, excitement, if they don't like this world, they'll make their own world up. They morph reality to suit themselves, no matter how pathologically twisted their imaginations are...We have to be very cautious about believing everything they say, because children can invent anything you can imagine.

So there you have it. When the aliens invade, World of Warcraft will be the reason we don't believe the children who try to warn us. Way to go, Blizzard.

Also, Space Harrier on a cell phone? That's all the Danish could manage to represent "fascinating, fantastic fairy tale universes"?