Parents often drop their children off at the movies, but how much do they know about the movies their young ones see?
When the parents were children, most of the movies they saw were harmless fun. But today, even PG-rated movies contain violence, sexual references and foul language that might bother children -- and their parents, if they knew about it.
Recently, Y-Press brought together some mothers and daughters to discuss some recent movies. Cathy Donnelly and her daughter, Emma Hulse, and Elena Boetto and her daughter, Anna, share their views on how movies affect children today.
Scary movies
ANNA, 10: I love scary movies. I like it when I get scared.
MRS. BOETTO: I have always liked scary movies, but we don't do Poltergeist- type movies. We do Creature From the Black Lagoon.
EMMA, 13: Scary stories really freak me out. I never watch them, mainly because my parents don't really watch them.
Most kids at my school just love scary movies and talk about them for days afterward. Lots of people really liked The Haunting, but the commercials scared me.
MS. DONNELLY: Violent stabbing, shooting, hacking, showing blood is too violent, and it's too scary.
EMMA: (I don't like) rape scenes.
ANNA: I don't like the music when something bad is going to happen.
MRS. BOETTO: I don't like twisted-mind stuff. I don't want my kids to think that that's a way that people really think or that it's normal.
ANNA: Movies like Chucky's Bride and Chucky II, some people can't take the suspense. You're just sitting there, and he just comes up and murders someone. I mean, you stay up all night, and it affects school.
Violent scenes
MS. DONNELLY: I went to see Casino, when it first came out, with my family. They kind of chose the movie. It was so violent, it was just sickening. I walked out. And the scary part of that is it was real.
MRS. BOETTO: What scares me most (about) the violence is with kids who want to stand out in some way. These violent movies give them some hope of celebrity.
ANNA: You know the Colorado thing? I think movies pretty much triggered that.
Sexual themes
MS. DONNELLY: I don't like The Spy Who Shagged Me. It's totally out of range for PG-13.
MRS. BOETTO: I think a lot of kids do like that movie. It's not for us. Friends younger than (Anna) went to see it with their parents, so it was real difficult for me to put my foot down and say, "You're not going."
EMMA: I think movies that have nudes, such as Titanic . . . I think it's tasteless. I think it's meant to attract people to see it, particularly young men. I don't think it's right, and I don't think it's fair.
ANNA: In Titanic, there were some parts of it that were kind of bad. But I think it mattered if you saw it. I mean, some people judge you on if you've seen it.
Sometimes that's the only thing that they can talk about for a week, and then you haven't seen it so you're just dropped out of the conversation.
MRS. BOETTO: I knew it was a big issue, and that was one of the things that tore me about not letting her see it.
What parents should do
MRS. BOETTO: We've watched some movies that after I saw them I think were probably borderline, and we watched them with the kids. But at least we talked about it.
When you drop them off at the movies, you don't really get a chance to explain to the kids, "Yeah, that bothered you and this is why: because this isn't normal."
MS. DONNELLY: If you know your child well, you should go and see the movie first and see if you think they can handle it.
EMMA: I'm going to have to agree with my mom on that. Parents need to watch the movies kids see until they get to be about 10 or 15.
ASSISTANT EDITOR: Kate Lumpkin, 14