ShareThisA guide to movies from a family perspective:
"The Haunting in Connecticut"
-- Rated: PG-13.
-- Suitable for: Mature teens and up.
-- What you should know: Star Virginia Madsen was adamant in a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette interview that nobody under 13 should see the movie. It's based on a true story, although dramatic license has been taken, about a family living in a haunted house and coping with a teen-age son with cancer.
-- Language: A couple of uses of "Jesus" and a few four-letter words.
-- Sexual situations and nudity: None.
-- Violence/scary situations: Lots of both, starting with the son's prognosis and including almost nonstop frightening occurrences in the house, which once was a funeral home and site of seances involving the expulsion of ectoplasm. Children and adults are in danger, corpses are shown (sometimes being mutilated), a character appears badly burned and a dangerous fire rages.
-- Drug or alcohol use: The father of the family drowns his sorrows in booze and goes on a rampage.
"Monsters vs. Aliens"
-- Rated: PG.
-- Suitable for: Preschoolers or anyone who can sit attentively through a 90-minute movie.
-- What you should know: If seen in 3-D, moviegoers must wear special glasses. Story is animated and uses 1950s creature features such as "The Attack of the 50 Foot Woman," "The Blob" and "The Fly" as inspiration for this comic adventure about mutants fighting off aliens.
-- Language: Nothing notable.
-- Sexual situations and nudity: None.
-- Violence/scary situations: A fair amount, including the transformation of a bride-to-be into a giant. Weapons are fired, the Golden Gate Bridge collapses and the planet endangered, although the storytelling style keeps it fun and not too scary.
-- Drug or alcohol use: None, although a joke is made about mixing an "Atomic Gin Fizz."
"Knowing"
-- Rated: PG-13.
-- Suitable for: Mature high-school students and older moviegoers.
-- What you should know: This is a violent, frightening thriller about a university professor (Nicolas Cage) who realizes that seemingly random numbers, scribbled by a girl 50 years earlier and locked in a time capsule, actually are a code to disasters past, present and to come.
-- Language: A half-dozen mild expletives.
-- Sexual situations and nudity: None.
-- Violence/scary situations: Many, many, many, including a horrific airplane crash, deadly underground subway crash, references to other catastrophes, kidnapping of children, talk about parents who died and frantic discussions about the end of the world and the destructive, fiery aftermath.
-- Drug or alcohol use: Cage's character is seen drinking and overindulging in wine and whiskey.
"Race to Witch Mountain"
-- Rated: PG.
-- Suitable for: 8-year-olds and up.
-- What you should know: This is a sort-of remake of 1975's "Escape to Witch Mountain." It stars Dwayne Johnson (previously known as The Rock) as a Vegas cab driver trying to help two alien teens save their home planet and Earth.
-- Language: Nothing notable.
-- Sexual situations and nudity: None.
-- Violence/scary situations: Lots, including the exchange of punches, violent car chases, a massive train derailment, much gunfire, a scary robot and dogged UFO investigators who pursue the children and hold them captive. The prospect of aliens from outer space, even blond ones who travel through wormholes, could be unsettling.
-- Drug or alcohol use: None.
"Watchmen"
-- Rated: R.
-- Suitable for: 17 and older, just like the R rating says.
-- What you should know: Based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons.
-- Language: R in nature; liberal use of the f-word.
-- Sexual situations and nudity: Yes and yes. Most disturbing is a brutal attempted rape, and most explicit is a scene of nude lovemaking. A prostitute bares her breast, and a naked Nite Owl (Patrick Wilson) is seen from behind. Dr. Manhattan, a digitally created blue superhero who is anatomically correct, often walks around nude.
-- Violence/scary situations: Both, throughout. The blood flows almost from the opening scene. People are killed in as many ways as you can imagine. Bones are broken, limbs are severed - no one is spared, including children and animals.
-- Drugs and alcohol: Liquor and wine are consumed.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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