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Original poster

Titanic argument about Slumdog Millionnaire

87 replies

Quattrocento · 07/06/2009 10:12

About once a month or so, I dragoon the family into watching a family DVD. Yesterday the DVD of choice (mine and DDs) happened to be Slumdog Millionnaire.

The film is 15-rated. The DCs are 9&11. I must say at the outset that I had not realised the film was a 15-rating. I thought it was suitable for children because a friend had taken her DCs to the cinema to see it (15, and 13x2).

Be that as it may, we were all safely esconced in the living room, with DSIL&Co when the opening scene, which contains some violence, appeared. For those who haven't seen the film, he was in police custody having electric shocks administered.

DH ERUPTED, and started shouting immoderately that this was totally unsuitable for children and after 5 minutes of shouting switched over to Robin Hood. Where several people were shot and one person was stabbed. I pointed this out and DH stormed out of the room.

I just wanted to fast-forward through the violent bits of SM. I wanted the DCs to watch it just to get some appreciation of what life is like for some children.

Obviously I was being unreasonable not to have checked the film classification but why couldn't we just watch the thing once it was here? And scoot through the violent bits?

OP posts:
Original poster
Quattrocento · 07/06/2009 15:46

I'm starting to think I have extraordinarily robust children

They have survived titanic arguments AND Slumdog Millionaire.

Doubtless I will pay through the nose for therapy in later years.

Perhaps I should start saving now? A curious feature of online bank accounts is that they have names. So "Real savings" "Slush fund", "DC's education" could be accompanied by "Therapy".

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BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 16:00

We took DD (4) and the DSSs (13 and 11 at the time) to see Slumdog Millionaire at the cinema, the week it came out here in Paris. We all enjoyed it very much indeed .

It was open to all here (PG equivalent) (under threes aren't allowed in the cinema at all, though).

donnie · 07/06/2009 16:08

haven't read the entire thread but i would not consider it at all suitable for a 9 year old and probably not an 11 yr old either. There is an awful lot about prostitution, abuse and slavery in it and some of the scenes ( the spoon one as an eg) are very nasty. No point in skipping through all of these scenes as they contribute so much to the film as a whole. Not a good idea IMO.

Then again I hear a lot of these popular video games are crammed full of violence and menacing imagery and loads of parents are quite happy to let their dc play them .

My parents were quite strict with my brothers and i when were growing up. I remember they wouldn't let us watch the Sweeney ! or MASH as there were hospital scenes of gore and blood.

My dd1 is 7 and loves the soundtrack to slumdog which we play in the car all the time. She keeps asking me about the film but i have to gloss over certain parts. Quite a lot of parts in fact.

donnie · 07/06/2009 16:15

the whole 'exposing the children to the harsher realities of the world' is a very interesting topic though. I do talk to my dd about certain things but she is too young and sensitive at the moment to grasp a lot of things. She was very aware of what was going on in Gaza in january and she has been asking me about Omaha beach this weekend for obvious reasons. I don't know if film is the best medium through which to convey truths of this kind though. Probably books are better. Less graphic. She has a really good book about Anne Frank but knows very little - if anything - about Hitler and gas chambers. For now I want to keep it that way.

Original poster
Quattrocento · 07/06/2009 16:17

See, I knew I was being a continental at heart

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BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 16:21

We are so used to taking DD to the cinema with us regardless of the language of the film that we blithely took her to see Abrazos Rotos (the new Almodovar - I don't know what it's called in English) a couple of weeks ago. It was only when we had bought the tickets and were queuing to get into the cinema that it suddenly occurred to me that she could neither understand Spanish nor read French yet...

Nighbynight · 07/06/2009 16:36

I am guessing the film of Slumdog Millionaire doesnt follow the book too closely then, as the book is definitely not suitable for children.

It is really annoying the way things are marketed as family, and then you realise that the original film behind the hype is a 15. I got caught in a similar way with Pirates of the Karibik - I never bothered to check the film, becuase there had been so much merchandise in the shops that was clearly aimed at primary school age children.

Normally I would stick to the age ratings, as some of my children have got upset when allowed to see older films by ex h.

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 16:42

A couple of months ago the Ciné Club at my DD's school organised an advance showing of Impy Wonderland for the children in maternelle and the first two years of primary (ie children from 3 to 8). I went along with DD more because I support the principle of a Ciné Club than because I was interested in the film, about which I knew little but the posters did not attract me.

I have to say that I thought the film was vile and deeply corrupting. I was very upset that my DD had seen it.

I have a great deal of difficulty understanding why films with a strong moral message, like Slumdog Millionaire, are considered by some to be unsuitable for children.

pointydog · 07/06/2009 16:49

I wouldn't let my kids watch a 15 until they are 15 (if I have any control over it). I tend to agree with the classification of films. I've seen Slumdog and I agree with its classification too.

There are 101 ways to encourage children to find out about the dire conditions other children in teh world endure without watching a 15 film. Didn't you wacth Comic Relief or look up all their brilliant short films on the internet?

I also find it very irritating to ff through parts of a film. I couldn't be doing with that.

Nighbynight · 07/06/2009 16:51

Anna, I was thinking of the first part of the book - where he gets tortured by putting chili up his anus, iirc.
Agree about the strong moral message, but don't really want to find myself explaining that one to dd2 aged 5.

pointydog · 07/06/2009 16:53

Do you really have a great deal of difficulty understanding that, anna, or are you just enjoying standing apart from teh crowd?

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 16:56

I suppose that I find myself explaining so many things to DD, by virtue of the fact that we live in a big city and see unpleasant and dangerous sights frequently in the course of daily life, that the cinema seems immensely sanitised and safely removed from daily life in comparison.

Original poster
Quattrocento · 07/06/2009 16:56

I haven't read the book, but in the film it turned into a dormitory prank, where the children took chillies and put them on the young boy's willy (subtitle "He has chillies on his willy." Which the DCs found funny, and I laughed too.

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francagoestohollywood · 07/06/2009 16:57

I haven't seen slumdog millionaire.
I do not like FF movies.
But I did watch lots on unsuitable movies in my childhood, because I loved watching movies and was intrigued by complicated or even tragic storylines.
My dc are still quite young, and I haven't decided as yet if I'll be as liberal as my parents have been with me!

francagoestohollywood · 07/06/2009 16:59

to ff movies, I menat. Not formula fed movies.

pointydog · 07/06/2009 16:59

if slumdog seemed com pletely sanitised and far removed from real life I d on't see how it could communicate a powerful message about anything

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 17:00

From experience, the only things that have really frightened DD are things she has witnessed at first hand on the streets of Paris, which are hard for her to understand because she doesn't know enough to put them into context and happen right before her eyes in places she knows (and sometimes to people she knows).

The cinema puts things into context and so it is much easier for her to understand them; and it isn't frightening because it happens at a distance.

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 17:03

Oh come on pointydog - the whole point about cinema as an art is not to make you feel as if you are living the thing first hand, but to give you perspective and food for thought!

Nighbynight · 07/06/2009 17:03

dd1 refuses to go and visit the Tutankhamoun exhibition in Munich, because ex h let her see a scarey film about mummies when she was about 5, she says. No amount of reasoned argument will get her to change her mind.

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 17:05

We went to see the exhibition Our Body/A Corps Ouvert with real dead people and DD thought it was great! As did we all. The French authorities pulled it in the end because apparently it broke some law about the exploitation of dead people.

Nighbynight · 07/06/2009 17:05

OK, I am giving in to dd's nagging - we are off to a Volksfest to test our theory that the Red Cross stall tries to get rid of all its prizes on the last day of the Fest

pointydog · 07/06/2009 17:06

I would have thought a pre-schooler would need an adult to put real life violence and extreme cinema violence into context.

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 17:08

When we watch films together, we always discuss them afterwards - we all need to put them into context according to our own, different levels of understanding of the world around us.

When children witness violence and deprivation on the streets around them, they need a lot more explanation than when they see these things at a safe distance at the cinema.

pointydog · 07/06/2009 17:09

I believe different people react differently to cinema, anna, as this discussion is proving. There are many films I couldn't watch that many other people could. I do not think there is one right way to view this.

BonsoirAnna · 07/06/2009 17:12

I know from experience with my DD that the violence/deprivation she has had to talk about with me many times, in order to understand it and to overcome her very real and deep fear, is the real life violence/deprivation she has witnessed, not the cinema violence/deprivation.

I don't know what sort of environment you live in pointdog...