Plot: Conrad Jarrett (Timothy Hutton) has returned home after four months in a mental hospital. He tried to kill himself following a tragic boating accident with his brother, Bucky, who drowned. He is trying to find a way to fit in, both at home and at school. His father, Calvin (Donald Sutherland), tries to reach out to him, but is afraid of saying the wrong thing, and is shy about his own emotions. His mother, Beth (Mary Tyler Moore), is uncomfortable with emotions and with anything else that might be “messy” or hard to control.

After some hesitation, Conrad seeks out Dr. Berger (Judd Hirsch), a psychiatrist recommended to him when he left the hospital, telling him that he is seeking “control.” Berger warns him that control is tough to achieve, but says he will do what he can. He advises Conrad to start from the outside, work on his actions and let the feelings follow.

Conrad begins to reach out to a sympathetic girl at school, Jeannine (Elizabeth McGovern). He makes contact with Karen (Dinah Manoff), a friend from his hospital stay, who seems to have “control,” to be busy with friends and activities and sure of herself. He is devastated when he tries to call her again, and hears that she has killed herself. He calls Berger in the middle of the night, and insists on seeing him. He relinquishes what he thinks of as “control” to confess to Berger — and himself — that he can’t forgive himself for surviving when his brother died, that he feels guilty and unworthy.

Calvin begins to realize that Beth’s unwillingness to connect to her own emotions or anyone else’s is suffocating the family. They had had the appearance of closeness, but the tragedy revealed how superficial it was. Their relationship unravels quickly, and she leaves, as Cal and Conrad begin to share their feelings.

Discussion: This is a movie about emotional honesty, about the courage and emotional vocabulary that are necessary for the connections and intimacy we need to be able to survive challenges like the tragedy faced by this family. Berger says, “If you can’t feel pain, then you’re not going to feel anything else, either.” The characters represent a wide variety of approaches and abilities to emotional openness and “control.” Conrad and Calvin are both groping their way toward a better understanding of themselves and others and the ability to communicate.

Beth does not want to try. She is by no means an ogre. Indeed, it is clear that the director and writer of the movie feel sorry for her. She has chosen emptiness she can control rather than “messy” feelings. Beth preferred Bucky to Conrad because Bucky’s easy confidence did not place any emotional demands on her. Conrad says, “I can’t talk to her! The way she looks at me! She hates me!” What Conrad feels as rejection is really Beth’s fear that his sensitivity and vulnerability will put demands on her that she can’t or won’t be able to respond to. She can’t bear the thought that she might somehow be responsible for Conrad’s pain, while Calvin is willing to confront that issue in order to be able to help Conrad.

Jeannine at first pulls back from Conrad’s attempt to connect with her by telling her the truth about himself, but then apologizes. She wants to understand him; it was just that at first she did not know how to respond, so retreated into the more comfortable and familiar environment of joking around. In contrast, Karen, who seems to have so much “control” and goes to elaborate pains to persuade Conrad that she is doing fine, is unable to cope.

Teenagers may know of someone who has attempted suicide, or of someone who has been successful. This movie provides an opportunity to discuss what led Conrad and Karen to consider it, how the perspective of a person about his own worth is very different from that of those around him, and what the other options are for people who are deeply depressed. Questions for Kids:

· Why is control so important to Conrad? Is it important to Beth and Calvin, too?

· What do you think of Berger’s advice about starting from the outside?

· How does Berger help Conrad? How does Jeannine help him?

· Why does he quit the swim team? Why doesn’t he tell his parents?

· How do you feel about Beth? Do you dislike her or feel sorry for her or both? Why is it so hard for her to give her husband and son what they feel they need?

Connections: This film received Oscars for Best Picture, Screenplay, and Supporting Actor (Timothy Hutton). It also popularized the lovely “Canon” by Pachelbel. Viewers of “Nick at Nite” will recognize Mary Tyler Moore from “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”

There is logic, there is movie logic, and then there is the kind of “throw some big musical numbers and some good-looking stars on the screen and no one will notice that it makes no sense whatsoever — just look at ‘Flashdance'” logic. “Rock Star” is in that last category, and while it is not as preposterously entertaining as “Flashdance,” it is still has moments of guilty pleasure.

The story goes back to “Cinderella,” or at least to “Rocky,” with a little bit from Pinocchio. Chris (Mark Wahlberg) a 1980’s metal band’s biggest fan, gets picked out of obscurity to become the band’s new lead singer, only to find that dreams are not always what they seem from the outside. The equivalent of Pinocchio’s visit to the place where boys get turned into donkeys is Chris’s life of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, with increasingly more of the former. But before you can say “This would make a great episode of ‘Behind the Music,'” he sees the error of his ways, and finds the girl who loved him all along. I think he even invents grunge, the next new music craze, because he somehow goes from shrieking hard rock in leather pants to playing anquished ballads in a Seattle coffee house. Then there’s the clinch and the fade-out, followed by the movie’s most entertaining scenes, the out-takes shown during the credits.

The movie’s biggest problem is that it cannot make up its mind whether it wants to be a satire or play it straight. It tweaks the rock star worldview now and then, but no one could ever send up metal bands better than that masterpiece mockumentary, “This is Spinal Tap,” and they do not even try. That leaves us with an umimaginative rise-and-fall story that never really captures our hearts or even our attention. At least that makes it easier to ignore major lapses in the storyline.

Wahlberg enjoys himself onscreen, but it is impossible not to compare this to his performance in the vastly more complex and intelligent “Boogie Nights,” another movie about a naive young man who is brought into a world of debauchery and corruption. Jennifer Anniston is woefully underused in a standard-issue “good woman who stands by her man and holds on to her values” role that gives her only a few brief opportunities to show her crackerjack timing and ability to give snap to anything within 50 miles of a comeback. It is nice to see the musicians played by real-life guitarists Zakk Wylde and Brian Vander Ark, bassist Jeff Pilson and drummer Jason Bonham.

Parents should know that the movie is rated R for very strong language, nudity, explicit sexual situations (including group sex and bisexual encounters), and abuse of every kind of licit and illicit substance (even hotel room furniture). Many characters give the finger. There is an explicit close-up of a very unhygienic nipple-piercing. A gay character is insulted and fired from his job. The overall message is that the sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll lifestyle is empty and destructive, but not unappealing, for a short time anyway. Interestingly, there is some suggestion that it is a cynical marketing strategy, though that appears to be rationalization. One nice shift from the usual format for this kind of movie is that Chris has parents who are entirely loving and supportive of his passion for metal, and genuinely enjoy the music themselves.

Families who see this movie should talk about how some people limit themselves to dreaming that they can be exactly like someone else, instead of thinking about dreams that allow them to be most themselves. Why was it so easy for Chris to lose his way, while Emily saw that it was wrong? Why was it important for her to have her own life and career? What do we learn about Chris from the way he gets back on stage after his fall? What does he learn about himself? Do you agree with the comment that “we all owe somebody an apology along the way?”

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy This Is Spinal Tap (Special Edition) (mature material). They also might like to compare the Steel Dragons’s song “Anything Goes” to a classic song by the same name by Cole Porter.

Animal Husbandry,” a wry and witty book about a single woman’s efforts to understand men, has become “Someone Like You” a generic looking-for- love-in-all-the-wrong-places romance with plot twists that were tired back in the days of Sandra Dee and Bobby Darrin.

Ashley Judd, once again adding more heart and star power to a movie than it deserves, plays Jane Goodale (sounds like Jane Goodall, the chimp expert, get it?), a booker for a television talk show hosted by Diane (Ellen Barkin, looking a little washed out but always fun to watch). The people booked on the show are called “gets,” and ambitious Diane tells Jane that what she wants on her show is “the un-get-able get” the elusive guest that everyone wants but no one has.

Meanwhile, Jane is looking for a “get” of her own, a man who will love her as much as she loves him. But that seems really un-get-able. If she isn’t looking for love in all the wrong places, she is certainly looking in most of them. Ray Brown (Greg Kinnear), Diane’s new producer, seems like The One, and Jane is blissful, until he gets cold feet just as they are about to move in together. She ends up having to sublet a room from Eddie (“X-Men’s” Hugh Jackman). His womanizing provides the foundation for her emerging theory of male behavior. For example, when she asks him if it isn’t complicated when he begins dating the roommate of a woman he had recently dated, he says, “It’s never complicated for me.” Jane decides that men are genetically determined to act like bulls that refuse to service a cow a second time. Men are always looking for the “new cow.”

Jane’s best friend Liz (Marisa Tomei) persuades her to write a magazine column about the theory, under a pseudonym. Suddenly, everyone is talking about it and everyone, especially Diane, wants to interview the author. Ray tells Jane that he wants to get back together. Eddie turns out to be not heartless but recovering from a broken heart. If you have ever seen or even heard about any movie ever made, you know where it all leads.

So the only question is how much fun it is on the way to the happy ending, and the answer is: mildly. Judd delivers everything she can, and she makes Jane’s yearning to love as well as to be loved very poignant. Jackman, out of his Wolverine X-Men outfit turns out to clean up very nicely indeed, and makes a likable leading man. The dialogue is above average, and director Tony Goldwyn has some good ideas, but the plot twists are below average. This is especially clear in the last 15 minutes, which seem like a desperate attempt to think of any way to end it, and just don’t work at all.

Parents should know that the movie features sexual references and situations and some very strong language for a PG-13. Characters drink and smoke, and there are scenes in a bar. Drinking is shown as a solace for pain. Boxes of condoms and a diaphragm that has not been used for a while are shown for comic effect.

Families who see this movie should talk about the foolish choices made by Jane, Ray, and Eddie. Jane is so in love with the idea of love that she does not expect Ray to say that he loves her before they become intimate. She does not really know him when they have sex, and yet she expects him not just to know her but to love her. Jane and Liz think they have a problem figuring out men, but the problem is in understanding themselves. Eddie uses indiscriminate sex as a way of warding off intimacy. Ray is not able to be honest with himself or with the women in his life. None of them seem to have any sense of how enduring love grows, though the conclusion does suggest that it is more likely to grow between people who begin with emotional intimacy and get that on firm ground before moving on to other kinds.

Families who see this movie should look for Ashley Judd’s mother, country singer Naomi Judd, in a brief role as a make-up artist. And families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “Pillow Talk” with Doris Day and Rock Hudson and Judd’s performance in “Where the Heart Is.

In this movie, based on a story by science-fiction author Thomas M. Disch, a group of household appliances in a summer cottage, worried about their young master, leave home to go and find him, encountering many challenges and adventures along the way. It is exciting and fun, with a thrilling climax and delightful voice characterizations by Saturday Night Live stars Phil Hartman and Jon Lovitz. NOTE: Some very tense moments, with characters in peril.

Dedicated to “Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy,” this movie is both a spoof and a loving tribute to the silent classics, with good guys, bad guys, romance, adventure, slapstick, music, wonderful antique cars, and the biggest pie fight in history. The opening credits are on a series of slides like those in the earliest movies, complete with cheers for the hero and boos for the villain, and a flickering old-fashioned projector that at one point appears to break down. Always dressed in impeccable white, the Great Leslie (Tony Curtis) is a good guy so good that his eyes and teeth literally twinkle. His capable mechanic and assistant is Hezekiah (Keenan Wynn). The bad guy is Professor Fate (Jack Lemmon), assisted by Max (Peter Falk). Like Wile E. Coyote, Fate’s cartoonishly hilarious stunts to stop Leslie inevitably backfire.

After a brief prologue, in which Fate tries to beat Leslie in breaking various speed records, literally trying to torpedo him at one point, they both enter an automobile race from New York to Paris. So does a beautiful reporter (Natalie Wood as Maggie DuBois) trying to prove she can get the story — dressed in an endless series of exquisite ensembles designed by Hollywood legend Edith Head.

The race takes them across America, through the Wild West, to a rapidly melting ice floe in the Pacific, and into a European setting that is a cross between a Victor Herbert operetta and “The Prisoner of Zenda,” where a spoiled prince happens to look exactly like Professor Fate and it takes all of the stars to foil an evil Baron (Ross Martin) who wants to use Fate to take over the throne.