The Perils of Family Movie Night

Family movie night has become a happy ritual for us. We pull out the old popcorn popper and settle in for a cozy night of viewing togetherness. Really what greater fun is there than to share the movies of your youth with your kids? Well, think again. 

One of our recent picks was the original Escape to Witch Mountain and although both my husband and I recalled it had some suspense we had not bargained for a crazy man locking children in rooms and repeated flashbacks of a tragedy at sea. The same goes for dear, sweet, innocent Benji from 1974 which involved a pretty scary scene of kids being kidnapped and held captive for several days in an old, abandoned house.

What were these moviemakers of the 1970’s thinking? What were we thinking? I was shocked and felt like I deserved “The Worst Parent of the Year” award for showing them to my kids without carefully researching first. What I might recall as a fun movie from childhood I now view differently as a parent of three elementary school aged boys. When you start watching some of these movies you see them in a totally different light. 

Many families have a range of ages residing in the house so how do you pick a movie that pleases and doesn’t traumatize? Here are three tips to get you started:

1. Know your child. My youngest son has seen a few of the first Harry Potter movies and is enthralled. Had my twins seen these movies at his age they would have been terrified. Many movies contain innuendos that thankfully fly right over their heads but you have to be careful. It’s important to have a good gauge of each individual child and what he or she can or can’t handle. Some things that might seem harmless can actually be upsetting to certain kids. 
2. Don’t rely solely on the rating. Just because something is rated G doesn’t mean it’s for everyone. The original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is rated G but it traumatized me as a child. I had a fear of drowning and the scene where Augustus fell into the chocolate river and was sucked up into a tube stayed with me for years. Same for the boat ride where there are images of a chicken being decapitated and bugs crawling over a sleeping man. 
3. Do your research. Because you can’t rely on a rating do your due diligence.  The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) website  has an excellent parents guide written by users that lists every swear word, sexually implicit scene and so on. Cross check this with other sites like, http://www.kids-in-mind.com/ to make sure you’re covering your bases. Even some of the early Disney films like Snow White have some odd sexual undertones that again would fly over the heads of most kids but my 9 year olds thought it was a bit creepy. 

Implementing these few tips will insure that a happy family movie night doesn’t turn into trauma time with kids running for the hills!