Once upon a time there was a princess. She discovered that she was not the real princess after all. Her late father had imprisoned the real king and queen. All were now dead, but the real rulers had produced a son, who was now in hiding with two scholars. The princess determined to find him and give him back the throne that was rightfully his.

So, the princess went to spy on the prince and, this being a fairy tale, she fell in love with him at first sight. But no women were allowed near him. The scholars kept him in total seclusion, not just to protect his life, but also to protect his heart. They believed in pure rationality and spurned emotions, especially love. So the princess and her lady’s maid dressed up as boys and arrived at his doorstep, whereupon various complications ensue.

This story comes from a play first produced in 1732, now adapted to the screen by Clare Peploe and produced by her husband, Bernardo Bertolucci. Peploe keeps the setting of the story within its period, filming on location at magnificent houses dating back to the 18th century, but there are flickers of theatricality and modernity. A character appears to glimpse an audience in modern dress, seated on the magnificent lawn. Antique instruments on the soundtrack are briefly joined by an electric guitar (played by Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour). And at the end, the performers come out in for a curtain call, wearing their own clothes.

These references to the dualities of 18th/21st centuries and male/female roles are supposed to echo the story’s themes of duality and disguise. But it does a disservice to elements of the story that can only be understood in the context of their era. The princess (Mira Sorvino) has only three strategies – she commands, she bribes, and she seduces. Most of the story has her seducing the scholars Hermocrates (Ben Kingsley), his sister Leontine (Fiona Shaw), and, of course, the prince (Jay Rodan). In each succeeding conversation with the first two, she tells more and more lies. With the prince, she begins with lies, and then tells more and more truth, revealing more to him each time they meet.

Kingsley and Shaw are magnificent, but the clash between the artificial structure of the story and the more contemporary, naturalistic tone of the film only makes it more painful for us to see them manipulated so horrendously by the princess. Rachael Stirling (daughter of “Avengers” star Diana Rigg) is delicious as the lady’s maid and brightens the film whenever she appears.

Parents should know that the movie includes gender-bending seductions, including a same-sex kiss. There are no four-letter words, but there is some spicy language and brief nudity.

Families who see this movie should talk about how people right the wrongs of their forebears and about the complications of getting to know someone and have to decide how much of the truth about yourself to share.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, also featuring Kingsley and the romantic complications of a woman dressed as a man.

Most of E.B. White’s elegant language is missing and the animation is nowhere near the Disney level, but the new animated version of “Trumpet of the Swan” (G, some tension and peril) is still a very good family movie with much to enjoy and talk about.

As the movie begins, proud and loving trumpeter swans Father (Jason Alexander) and Mother (Mary Steenburgen) are awaiting the hatching of their new children. The young cygnets are all they dreamed of, except for Louie (Dee Baker), who is mute. This creates two problems. Louie cannot express his feelings without words, and he cannot attract a mate without the ability to make the trumpeting sound that gives this breed of swans their name.

Louie tries to solve the first problem with the help of a human friend named Sam, who takes him to school so that his teacher, Mrs. Hammerbottom (Carol Burnett) can teach him to read and write. Father tries to solve the second problem by stealing a trumpet from a musical instrument store. Even though Father knows it is wrong to take something without paying for it, he feels that he must do it to help his son.

Louie’s skill at reading and writing does not do him any good with the swans, who cannot understand him, but he does find a sweet girl swan named Serena who understands him without words. But he cannot settle down with Serena until he puts his father’s heart at rest by finding a way to pay for the trumpet. After many adventures, Louie and Serena are able to live happily ever after.

Families who see this movie should talk about the importance of finding a way to communicate and the value of people who can understand us. They will also want to talk about the conflict faced by Father, who wanted so desperately to help his son that he was willing to risk his life and do something he knew was wrong.

Families who enjoy this movie should read the wonderful book, along White’s other classics, “Charlotte’s Web” and “Stuart Little.” They will enjoy the movie versions of those stories as well.

“Hardball” is a softball, and this umpire calls it out at first base.

Keanu Reeves plays a compulsive gambler named Conor O’Neill who owes a lot of money to various thugs. A childhood friend offers to pay him $500 a week if he will take over the friend’s responsibility to coach a baseball team in Chicago’s Cabrini Green, one of the nation’s most dangerous housing projects. You know where it goes from there because you’ve seen it in “The Bad News Bears” and “The Mighty Ducks” and dozens of clones. That is not always a bad thing – there’s always room for another story of underdogs and redemption. But this one never delivers on any of the opportunities that formula creates. There’s a nine-member team and we barely get to know any of them except for two inevitable cliches — the fat kid and the cute little kid who talks a lot. Reeves can be terrific in a part that suits his range, but the blankness that works well for him in dumb parts (“Bill and Ted”) and silent parts (“Speed,” “The Matrix”) does not give him enough to work with when he is supposed to be struggling with his compulsion to gamble or angry with himself for getting into trouble. Reeves gets no help from the script, which makes him behave in an arbitrary and inconsistent manner and does not have a single memorable line of dialogue. We don’t want to be told that he and the kids come to care for each other in a movie like this – we want to be shown. And there is not one moment of practice, teaching skills (baseball or otherwise), or conversation to make us believe it.

The movie makes the most of the audience’s inherent commitment to the storyline. We want those kids to make it, and we want Conor to make it, too. The other reason to watch is yet another quietly arresting performance by Diane Lane, who brings a delicacy and complexity to every moment she is on screen.

The script is strictly by-the-numbers, but there is a timely plot twist concerning a player with a forged birth certificate. One of the movie’s most wrenching scenes shows him after he is kicked off the team, wearing gang colors and warning his former teammates with a meaningful glance to get away quickly.

Parents should know that the movie includes very strong language, including many four-letter words used by children. The boys are surrounded by drug use and gang violence. They can identify the weapon by the sound of the shooting and take it for granted that they must sit on the floor to be out of the way of gunfire that might come in the window. One child is badly beaten and another is killed.

I have to say something here about the MPAA’s rating system. This film was originally intended to be released as an R, due to the language used by the children. The producers argued that it was an authentic portrayal of the way that people in that environment speak. Protests during the filming, and, more significantly, marketing concerns about whether the audience really wanted an R-rated movie about a little league team, led them to cut some of the worst language to obtain a PG-13 rating. This shows again the absurdity of the MPAA’s standards because the movie still has some material, including the gang shooting of a child, that is far more likely to be upsetting to younger audiences than a few four-letter words.

Families who see this movie should talk about how the children helped Conor realize that he needed to make some changes. Why was it important that Conor made a rule that the players could not insult each other? What did Conor learn from G-Baby? What do you think will happen to the members of the team when they get too old to play in the league?

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy The Sandlot and Angels in the Outfield. They might also like To Sir, with Love.