THE PIANIST
RATING: R
STARRING: Adrien Brody, Daniel Caltagirone, Thomas Kretschmann, Frank Finlay, Maureen Lipman, Emilia Fox, Ed Stoppard, Julia Rayner, Jessica Kate Meyer, and Ruth Platt
DISTRIBUTOR: Focus Features
DIRECTOR: Roman Polanski
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Timothy Burrill, Lew Rywin and Henning Molfenter
PRODUCER: Robert Benmussa, Roman Polanski and Alain Sarde
WRITER: Ronald Harwood
GENRE: Historical War Drama
INTENDED AUDIENCE: Older teenagers and adults
SUMMARY: The Pianist tells the true story of a Jewish pianist’s survival during the National Socialist Holocaust in World War II. Though laced with some strong violence, The Pianist tells an uplifting, moral story of survival amidst dark human cruelty. Since Polanski survived the German National Socialist Holocaust in the Kracow ghetto, it is with intimate first-hand knowledge that he tells the story of another survivor, Wladyslaw Szpilman.
Going into the film, there is a tendency to say, "Not one more Holocaust movie," but this is not just another Holocaust movie. It is a history, which has been brought to life by a brilliant mind and will speak to everyone with its good sense, to all who seek to understand the past. The Pianist is arguably his best movie to date. Certainly, it is the first to give credit to God.
CONTENT: Underlying Judeo-Christian worldview with moral perspective set during the horrible devastation of the Holocaust; eight obscenities and three profanities, which could be exclamations; intense holocaust violence, but not gory, including people shot at point blank range, people hunted, Jews beaten, boy beaten to death, talk of a mother smothering her child, man in wheelchair thrown off of balcony, war time fighting, guns, bombs, whippings, and terror; a kiss, alcohol in moderation; smoking; and, lying, cheating and stealing to survive.
JUST MARRIED
RATING: PG-13
STARRING: Ashton Kutcher, Brittany Murphy, Christian Kane, David Rasche, Veronica Cartwright, and Raymond J. Barry
DISTRIBUTOR: Twentieth Century Fox
DIRECTOR: Shawn Levy
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Tracey Trench, Josie Rosen and Lauren Shuler Donner
PRODUCER: Robert Simonds
WRITER: Sam Harper
GENRE: Romantic Comedy
INTENDED AUDIENCE: Teenagers and young adults
SUMMARY: Just Married, a romantic comedy with plenty of slapstick, tells what happens to a young married couple when their honeymoon goes drastically wrong. Just Married ultimately portrays marriage in a positive light and has surprisingly good performances and a clever script, but it contains many questionable thematic elements, including too much foul language and too many sexual references.
Through a series of mishaps and mistakes, Tom and Sarah discover that marriage is more than the honeymoon ideal of champagne and fancy hotels. Convinced they’ve discovered that they aren’t compatible, they prepare to call it quits. When Tom’s father reminds him that love is more than passion, Tom revitalizes their relationship. The movie begins by touting the mantra that "love is enough." While it doesn’t deviate from that, the protagonists discover by the end that their definition of love wasn’t big enough.
CONTENT: Romantic worldview, including slight disrespect of priest and Bible (brief sarcastic comment), with a greedy, mean-spirited father who puts down boy because of wealth, as well as moral elements such as love draws family members together and conquers their differences, husband’s father tells him that marriage is about work and love, not simply happy moments, and husband flees temptation; about 30 obscenities, six strong profanities, nine light profanities; much slapstick violence includes married couple shoves each other and throw things, bloody nose, wife hits husband in head when she throws heavy ashtray at him, electrical shock starts small fire, crashing car into gate.
