Raising Your Kids to Love Movies

[seabterry]

I am taking my 8 year old tonight to see Back to the Future Part 2 in theaters. She recently watched Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom with me. We have watched the first three Mission Impossible movies together. I watched Jaws with her. Jurassic Park was a big one we watched. I plan on Terminator 2 soon since I saw it in theaters when I was younger than her. I know that people disagree with kids watching movies, especially rated R films.

Is anyone else teaching their kids about movies at a young age?

[VanDammage80]

Originally Posted by seabterry

I am taking my 8 year old tonight to see Back to the Future Part 2 in theaters. She recently watched Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom with me. We have watched the first three Mission Impossible movies together. I watched Jaws with her. Jurassic Park was a big one we watched. I plan on Terminator 2 soon since I saw it in theaters when I was younger than her. I know that people disagree with kids watching movies, especially rated R films.

Is anyone else teaching their kids about movies at a young age?

Hell, I didn't even wait until 8. My 5 year old has already seen all of those except for T2 and the MI movies. lol He LOVES Jaws and JP. That's actually him dressed up has Jason in my profile pic.

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by VanDammage80

Hell, I didn't even wait until 8. My 5 year old has already seen all of those except for T2. lol He LOVES Jaws and JP. That's actually him dressed up has Jason in my profile pic.

I didn't wait until 8 either. I think she watched the first three Jurassic Park films when she was 5 or 6. It all started when the 3D version came to Blu-ray. I also have Alien for her since that was my wife's first Rated-R movie, while mine was T2. I've been waiting for the days to share movies with her since she was born because my Dad did that for me.

[VanDammage80]

Originally Posted by seabterry

I didn't wait until 8 either. I think she watched the first three Jurassic Park films when she was 5 or 6. It all started when the 3D version came to Blu-ray. I also have Alien for her since that was my wife's first Rated-R movie, while mine was T2. I've been waiting for the days to share movies with her since she was born because my Dad did that for me.

Same here. I was dying for him to watch all the movies that I loved. It's definitely a great experience showing them, isn't it?! We've watched quite a bit. Lets just say he's probably the only kid in his school that would be able identify the theme to The Rocketeer. Haha

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by VanDammage80

Same here. I was dying for him to watch all the movies that I loved. We've watched quite a bit. Lets just say he's probably the only kid in his school that would be able identify the theme to The Rocketeer.

We need to do The Rocketeer. I saw that in theaters. It'll be good to revisit it.

I work with 19 to 24 year old people and it is frustrating how many movies they know nothing about. The other day one of them told me they have never seen an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. No way I can let that happen to my two girls.

[VanDammage80]

Originally Posted by seabterry

We need to do The Rocketeer. I saw that in theaters. It'll be good to revisit it.

I work with 19 to 24 year old people and it is frustrating how many movies they know nothing about. The other day one of them told me they have never seen an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. No way I can let that happen to my two girls.

Nobody knows ANYTHING about movies where I work. Very irritating!!! Hell, there are 40 year olds here who haven't even seen E.T. or Star Wars. Just unacceptable.

[chris_sc77]

We are.
Try to show them good quality movies and not just garbage.
We try to watch stuff from our collection and netflix and library or anywhere where we dont have to watch commercials on TV

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by chris_sc77

We are.
Try to show them good quality movies and not just garbage.
We try to watch stuff from our collection and netflix and library or anywhere where we dont have to watch commercials on TV

Ha! Same here. I just learned that the library in walking distance (right across the street) has very good Blu-ray titles. Both of my kids don't fully understand commercials. It is usually like "wait...what is this...can we fast forward?"

[SkyAntoine]

My five year old daughter sat with us and her older sisters the other day while we did a marathon of Mama and the new Poltergeist. I think I'm going to run her away from movies.

All my kids love watching movies...even ones that terrify them.

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by SkyAntoine

My five year old daughter sat with us and her older sisters the other day while we did a marathon of Mama and the new Poltergeist. I think I'm going to run her away from movies.

All my kids love watching movies...even ones that terrify them.

I really didn't like Mama. The ending was a big turn off for me.

I want to watch the new Poltergeist, but the less than stellar reviews turn me off. Is it worth a watch? Didn't the site give it low scores on AQ?

[SkyAntoine]

Originally Posted by seabterry

I really didn't like Mama. The ending was a big turn off for me.

I want to watch the new Poltergeist, but the less than stellar reviews turn me off. Is it worth a watch? Didn't the site give it low scores on AQ?

I like del Toro so I was ok with the film up until the end. It isn't my favorite genre, but a good scare is fun this month.

I ONLY watched Poltergeist because I'm a fan of the original. I wanted to see how bad they butchered it and went in with extremely low expectations. I was more disappointed than I ever imagined. My kids were even laughing at how terrible it was.

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by SkyAntoine

I like del Toro so I was ok with the film up until the end. It isn't my favorite genre, but a good scare is fun this month.

I ONLY watched Poltergeist because I'm a fan of the original. I wanted to see how bad they butchered it and went in with extremely low expectations. I was more disappointed than I ever imagined. My kids were even laughing at how terrible it was.

I guess you just helped me make up my mind. I do love horror films though.

[Astro Zombie]

Originally Posted by chris_sc77

We are.
Try to show them good quality movies and not just garbage.
We try to watch stuff from our collection and netflix and library or anywhere where we dont have to watch commercials on TV

Do you show them movies under 120 minutes or are those off limits

[Foggy]

Originally Posted by Astro Zombie

Do you show them movies under 120 minutes or are those off limits

And what about PG's and PG-13's?

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by Astro Zombie

Do you show them movies under 120 minutes or are those off limits

I would, but something tells me it will be a two part ordeal. It better be good to grab her for that long. The day is coming where she will sit through my Lord of the Rings Extended Editions.

[chris_sc77]

Originally Posted by Astro Zombie

Do you show them movies under 120 minutes or are those off limits

sure. but we dont pay to see anything at the theater that is under 120 mins.

[seabterry]

Originally Posted by chris_sc77

sure. but we dont pay to see anything at the theater that is under 120 mins.

This is probably a good rule. My 4 year old still has trouble focusing for a full hour and a half in a theater. We will see how Goosebumps goes this weekend.

[callahan09]

I don't have kids, but when I was a kid my parents let me watch whatever I wanted. I watched A Nightmare on Elm Street with them when I was age 5. Then the Terminator movies came next. Another childhood favorite of mine was Conan the Barbarian. The only time I remember my mom yelling at my dad for letting me watch a movie was during Howard Stern's Private Parts at age 12, haha. Funny how uptight she was about a very sexually explicit movie with lots of nudity, but she never cared about me seeing movies with very explicit graphic violence. Although a lot of the movies had some nudity/sexuality in them, for some reason the extent of it in Private Parts made her really uncomfortable with my pre-teen self seeing it.

If I ever have kids, I'll let them see a lot of R-rated movies, but I'd always watch them first and there are certain ones that I wouldn't want them to see.

[bunkz323]

I'm trying to get him to watch regular films as well. My son is 4 and daughter is 2 so she's still your but my son I'm trying to get him into films. He loves animation films of course but they're are certain films he has watched so far. Commando, Chappie, I just showed him Back to the future last night and he was in Awe. It was exciting to see his reactions and then at then end when the delorean flies.....priceless.
He's been bugging me to see Jurassic World but I will first start with Jurassic Park.

[JackKnightStarman]

Personally I find the choices of movies that you are showing your children, a tad ridiculous. There is no ten year old who is mature enough to understand R-rated Taxi Driver, without having a considerably deep conversation about the themes in the movie, so they can understand what they just saw. Same goes for most PG-13 movies. It is all about themes.

I grew up with a very liberal mother. I was also a bit of a hard head being the youngest, and always wanted to be apart of the adult conversation early on. My mom thought that when I was eight it would be OK for me to see Tarzan the Apeman with Bo Derek. It wasn't, and it skewed my view a little bit about women at a very young age. It did result in some conversations, albeit uncomfortable ones. I saw Alien when it premiered on broadcast tv, before I had cable, and it was heavily edited. The next year I saw The Exorcist, which also was edited for content on the networks. It wasn't till 84 that we got cable and HBO, that I saw unedited R-rated movies on TV. We got a VCR later that year. I was eleven. And had conversations with my older sister, and my Mom, about what I was watching. Mind you I saw my first R movie before I was ever allowed to have a toy gun. My mother felt I needed to understand fully how dangerous guns were, before I was allowed to point one at someone.

The fact that I grew up with having discussions about questionable content in movies has made me even a stronger advocate in parenting. I am NOT saying that movies, books, music, breed real life violence. What I'm saying is young is young. Children although not the same, tend to have a very different way of processing info, and some just are not mature enough at a early age for themes that are in PG-13 and R-rated movies. A ten year old has no frame of reference to draw from in seeing Taxi Driver, Alien, or T2.

I am like many of you and want my kids to be movie lovers/aficionados, but sometimes we have to temper our excitement about showing them stuff, and be a little more concerned with how it might impact the child. My ten year old wants to see Alien. I was ten when I saw it edited on TV. My son is not as Horror inclined as I was at that age, for example, he couldn't get all the way past the first death in Jaws, like I could at the same age of 5. Even with my coaching and being there with him, he didn't want to see it. At 7, he finally said to me that he wanted to watch it. I am happy to report that we watch it quite a bit now, and I even took him to see it on the big screen for the Fortieth anniversary.

Just don't be in such a hurry for them to grow up.[emoji5]