Plot: Three Soviet bureaucrats arrive in Paris to sell some jewels so they can buy tractors. But the former Grand Duchess Swana (Ina Claire), who lives in Paris, is outraged, because they were her jewels confiscated during the Russian revolution. Her beau, Count Leon (Melvyn Douglas), goes to court on her behalf, seeking return of the jewels. More important, he goes to the three Russians and plies them with wine, food, and fun to distract them from their mission.

The Soviets respond by sending a stern and severe senior official, Lena Yakushova (Greta Garbo), to straighten things out. Leon, who calls her by the nickname “Ninotchka,” is unsuccessful in persuading her to enjoy the pleasures of Paris. Finally, he just tries to make her laugh. She is unmoved by even his best jokes, but when he falls over in his chair, she laughs uproariously. From then on, she warms to the pleasures of Paris and the charms of Leon. She dons an elegant little hat and a glamorous gown. She drinks champagne until she is tipsy.

Swana gets the jewels from a hotel employee sympathetic to the exiled Russian nobility. She tells Ninotchka she will give them back if Ninotchka will leave Paris (and Leon) immediately. Given her duty to the Soviet Union, Ninotchka has no choice. But soon, based on the success of their mission, the same three men are dispatched to Constantinople to sell furs, and soon Leon has corrupted them again and Ninotchka is sent to straighten things out. This time Leon is waiting for her, so they can stay together forever.

Discussion: Kids will need some introduction to the issues behind this enchanting romantic comedy. A few words about the state of the Soviet Union following the revolution and the different ideas of the communists and the capitalists will prepare them. The movie is really not about politics; it is about romance, and being open to the pleasures of life. Leon learns as much about this as Ninotchka does. Before she arrives, he is in what looks more like a business partnership than a love affair with Swana. He does not introduce the Soviets to food, drink, and girls in order to teach them about having a good time, but in a calculated attempt to profit. Ninotchka makes an emotionally honest man out of him as he makes an emotionally honest woman out of her. And note that as much as Ninotchka loves Leon, she will not compromise on her duty to her country. She completes her mission, even though she knows it may mean she will never see him again.

In a way, the story is the obverse of “Born Yesterday” and “My Fair Lady.” The women in those stories grow by using their intellect; Ninotchka grows by using her emotions.

Ernst Lubitsch was the master of the sophisticated romantic comedy. Close observers of his films notice that he often uses doors to tell the story. An example in this film is the way the Count’s successful corruption of the Soviet emissaries is shown through a succession of delightful treats being delivered to them through the doors of their hotel suite.

Questions for Kids:

· If they had gone to court, who would have won the jewels? What is the best argument for each side?

· What does Swana try to do when she sees Ninotchka at the nightclub?

· What would you say the “moral” of this little romantic comedy is?

Connections: This movie had one of the most famous ad slogans of all time: “Garbo Laughs.” The mysterious dramatic actress had not made a comedy before. Director Ernst Lubitsch reported that when he was considering her for the part, he asked her if she could laugh, and she said she would let him know, and then came back the next day to say she could, and to show him. “Silk Stockings” is a musical version of this story, with songs by Cole Porter. An odd update made in 1956 with Katharine Hepburn and Bob Hope(!) is called “The Iron Petticoat.”

Compare this movie to “Ball of Fire” by the same screenwriting team, another story of an intellectual who is taught to appreciate the more frivolous pleasures of life.

Activities: Older kids may want to read more about this era in Soviet history, or find out about the fall of the USSR and the current efforts of the former Soviet states at capitalism and democracy.

This is a dark and stylish tale of lies, cheating, extortion, incest, betrayal, and murder that begins in the antiseptic and meticulously maintained office of a dentist, Frank Sangster (Steve Martin).

Frank seems to have everything. He has a successful dental practice that is operated with efficient precision by his fiancée, Jean Noble (Laura Dern), yet he is vaguely unsatisfied. When beautiful patient named Susan Ivy (Helena Bonham Carter) asks for narcotic pain medication, Frank knows it is wrong, but he is drawn to Susan, fascinated, almost intoxicated by her. He agrees to prescribe 5 pills, his first small departure from a life of conventional propriety. Then the pharmacist calls to ask about the prescription, which Susan altered to say 50 pills. Frank knows it is wrong and that he could get into serious trouble, but he tells the pharmacist that it is all right and does not call the police. Susan comes to see him in the office after hours. He knows he should not perform dental work without staff around to assist him (and act as witnesses), but he agrees. They end up having sex. Every time he breaks the rules he ends up getting in deeper trying to cover up Susan’s violations and his own. Frank becomes more enmeshed and more trapped in his lies.

“Average man caught in a spiral of deceit” movies are really about the loss of control. Frank’s world at first appears to be as exact and precisely regulated as his dental office. Although he tells us in a voiceover that everything is the way he wants it, we see hints almost immediately that he finds it sterile and unsatisfying. He has not admitted even to himself that he senses something wrong, even corrupt, in his neatly ordered world.

Even before he meets Susan, we see hints of his tolerance for – and interest in – a less controlled life. Frank finds what looks like a dead body drenched in blood in his house. It turns out to be his ne’er-do-well brother Harlan (Elias Koteas), who decided to paint a room red and then took whatever drugs he could find in the house until he passed out. On his last visit, Harlan had made a crude pass at Jean, and she is impatient with Frank’s willingness to put up with him. Frank’s tolerance for Harlan at first looks like guilt – he is very successful, while his brother is a mess. But then, as we see Frank fall under Susan’s spell, it appears that Frank feels suffocated by his success and is intrigued by those who chose another path.

This movie is a throwback to classics of the “film noir” genre like “The Woman in the Window,” where a beautiful, seductive, mysterious, but possibly deceitful woman in distress draws the law-abiding hero into a web of corruption. Instead of rain-soaked streets on moonless nights, though, this film is set in the white, sun-lit environment of a California dentist. Director David Atkins and stars Martin, Dern, Koteas, and Bonham Carter make good use of the contrast between the bright, sterile setting and the dark desires of the characters, and the plot twists keep surprises coming until the very end.

Parents should know that the movie features graphic violence, murder, drug abuse, drug-dealing, and sexual situations, including incest and betrayal. Characters use very strong language.

Families who see this movie should talk about how people can feel suffocated by doing everything “right.” Why was Frank so fascinated by Susan? Why did he put up with Harlan? What did he really think of Jean? Why was it so hard for him to understand what he wanted? What do you think the author was trying to tell us with the names of the characters, like Jean Noble and Susan Ivy and Frank?

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice, and Laura.

Charlotte Vale (Bette Davis) is the repressed and depressed daughter of an imperious mother (Gladys Cooper), head of a wealthy and socially prominent Boston family. Miserably unhappy and insecure, she spends much of her time in her room, making carved boxes and sneaking forbidden cigarettes. A sympathetic sister-in-law introduces her to Dr. Jaquith (Claude Rains), an understanding psychiatrist. Under his care, at his sanitarium, she begins to develop some sense of herself as worthy, but is still terribly insecure when she departs on a cruise ship, for a rest, before returning home.

On the ship, she meets Jerry Durrance (Paul Henreid), an architect. At first awkward and self-deprecating, she begins to bloom under his attention, and they fall in love. But Jerry is married to a woman whose health is too fragile to consider divorce. They say goodbye, and Charlotte returns home. Her mother is as tyrannical as ever, insisting that Charlotte must do as she says or she will refuse to support her. Charlotte meets Elliott Livingston (John Loder), a kind businessman, who wants to marry her, and her mother approves. But when she sees Jerry again, she knows it is impossible for her to marry Elliott, and turns him down. This so infuriates her mother that she has a heart attack and dies.

Overcome with guilt, Charlotte returns to Dr. Jaquith. But at the sanitarium, she meets a troubled young girl, Tina, Jerry’s daughter. In reaching out to Tina, she finds her own strength and sense of purpose. When Charlotte goes home, Tina moves in with her. Jerry at first wants to take Tina away, thinking it is too much of an imposition, but Charlotte persuades him that it is a way for them to be close, telling him, “Don’t let’s ask for the moon; we have the stars.”

This movie has a lot of appeal for highly romantic teenagers of both sexes, and for those who are interested in the dynamics and impact of dysfunctional families. Charlotte’s mother is completely self-obsessed, consumed with power, incapable of compassion, much less love, for her daughter. As Dr. Jaquith says, “Sometimes tyranny masquerades as mother love.” Never hesitating to make it clear that Charlotte was unwanted, she demands that Charlotte make up for the burden she inflicted by being born by giving in to her every demand. But it is also clear that there is no way for Charlotte to be successful in pleasing her mother.

Dependent and fearful at the beginning, she has her mother’s contempt. But, as we see at the end, her independence and self-respect are much more threatening to her mother, who literally cannot survive Charlotte’s assertion of her right to her own life.

In one sense, Mrs. Vale as ogre disappears like the Wicked Witch of the West doused with water or the Queen of Hearts when Alice tells her she is only a card. In another sense, Mrs. Vale’s attack is the ultimate booby- trap for Charlotte, who must then grapple with the guilt she feels for “causing” her mother’s death. Both Mrs. Vale and Jerry’s off-screen wife assert what F. Scott Fitzgerald called “the tyranny of sickness” or what Dr. Jaquith might call passive-agressive behavior, using powelessness as the ultimate method of exercising power. This is a very important form of emotional blackmail to be able to identify.

The title of the movie is from a line by Walt Whitman that Dr. Jaquith gives to Charlotte: “Now voyager, sail forth to seek and find.” Charlotte learns not to be afraid of what she will find, to risk getting hurt, to risk allowing herself to be known, to risk caring about someone else.

It is also worthwhile for kids to see that Charlotte must love herself before she is able to love someone else, and that just as Jerry’s love helps her to bloom, she is able to do the same for Tina. Charlotte tells Jerry, “When you told me that you loved me, I was so proud, I could have walked into a den of lions; in fact I did, and the lion didn’t hurt me.” Just as important, helping Tina is the most enduring “cure” for her sense of being powerless and without purpose, and far better than marrying the man she did not love.

These days, the decision made by Charlotte and Jerry not to stay together seems almost quaint; we tend to think that everyone should have both the moon and the stars. Their sense of sacrifice and duty is worth talking about as well.

Families who see this movie should talk about these questions: Why did Charlotte have such a hard time feeling good about herself? Why did Jerry and Charlotte decide not to see each other any more? Why did seeing Jerry make Charlotte change her mind about marrying Elliott? What did Charlotte’s mother want from Charlotte? Was that fair? What should Charlotte have said to her mother? Why did helping Tina make Charlotte feel better?

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “The Three Faces of Eve.” They might also like to see Bette Davis and Claude Rains in another movie about love, sacrifice and lessons learned, “Mr. Skeffington.” Davis plays a self-centered and flighty woman who marries a man she does not love in order to protect her brother, discovering decades later how much she cares for her husband.

Renee Zellwegger’s lips should be eligible for their own Oscar. As the waitress who is such a big fan of a soap opera that she becomes convinced she is a character on it, she does more to convey her essential sweetness and strength of character with her lips alone than most actresses could manage using a couple of bodies.

Zellwegger plays Betty, a sweet, trusting woman married to a boorish used car salesman (Aaron Eckhardt, unrecognizable as Erin Brokovich’s biker boyfriend). She does not know that her husband has stolen some heroin and hid it in one of his cars. When he is scalped by a hitman who is searching for the heroin, Betty goes into what psychiatrists call a fugue state. She has no memory of seeing her husband killed. Instead, she thinks she has left him to return to her former fiancé, a soap opera doctor. So, she sets off to find him, not knowing that she is driving the car where her husband stashed the heroin. The two hitmen, Charlie (Morgan Freeman) and Wesley (Chris Rock), follow her so they can kill her. Meanwhile, she goes to Los Angeles, gets a job in a hospital, and meets the actor who plays her dream man.

Betty’s trip from Kansas to Los Angeles recalls the journey of that other famous Kansan, Dorothy. Both go to a fantasy land only to find that the answer is within themselves. As someone tells Betty, “Honey, you don’t need anybody. You know why? Because you’ve got yourself.”

Charlie, too, is chasing a dream, wanting to finish this one last job so he can retire but growing more and more drawn to the woman he is supposed to kill. Betty and Charlie both seek a dream that will let them leave their pasts behind.

Parents should know that the movie, while primarily a comedy, has some scary and violent moments. The scalping scene is pretty grisly. The movie also has strong language and sexual situations.

Families who see this movie should talk about how Betty learned that she could solve her own problems and follow her real dream of becoming a nurse. Betty’s husband describes the soap opera fans as “people with no lives watching each other’s fake lives.” Is that true of anyone who watches any television show or movie, including the people who watch this one? Is there a difference between watching for escape and watching for entertainment or insight? Why would Betty stay with such an awful husband for so long? Were any other characters chasing dreams? Who?

Families who like this movie will also enjoy “Nashville.”

Parents should not be fooled by the PG-13 rating into thinking that it might be appropriate for middle schoolers and younger kids. The people who rate movies for the MPAA seem to think that if it’s a comedy and no one uses the f-word, anything goes. But parents should be warned that the people behind this movie include the folks who brought us “Ace Ventura” and “American Pie.” In other words, if there’s a bodily function — or dysfunction — to make fun of, you’ll see it in this movie.

This is a sequel to Murphy’s popular remake of the Jerry Lewis classic, “The Nutty Professor.” In that movie, overweight professor Sherman Klump (Eddie Murphy) experiments with a weight-reduction formula that turns him into the svelt but mean Buddy Love. As this movie begins, Klump is no longer turning into Buddy Love, but he finds Love’s nasty comments coming out of his mouth, especially when he is around dream girl Professor Denice Gains (Janet Jackson). He tries to eradicate Buddy Love for once and for all through genetic alteration, but when the excised genetic material is mixed with a dog hair, Buddy Love emerges as a separate person, albeit one who likes to sniff things and play catch. Meanwhile, the university wants to sell Professor Klump’s youth formula of $150 million, but Buddy Love wants that money for himself.

There are jokes about poop pellets shooting out of the rear of a giant hamster, an old couple having sex, and a middle-aged couple who are not having sex. At the screening, the seven-year-old sitting next to me leaned over to ask her mother, “Mommy, what’s Viagra?” In one extended sequence, intended to be humorous, a man is sexually abused by the giant hamster. Then there is a huge bulge that grows behind Dr. Klump’s zipper until his alter ego — or rather his alter id — Buddy Love bursts forth.

Eddie Murphy is phenomenally talented, and the technology is stunning. Together, Murphy, make-up wizard Rick Baker, and the special effects wizards create six different completely believable characters. They make it all so seamless that you will forget that one person is playing six parts (seven, if you count one brief clip shown when one character watches television). The high point of the movie is the credit sequence, with outtakes that show just how good a job Murphy does in playing the brilliant, sweet geneticist Dr. Sherman Klump, his loving but anxious mother, his father, insecure about losing his job (and who tries the youth formula), his jealous brother, his earthy grandmother, and Buddy Love.

The real shame is that somewhere inside this gross-out raunch-fest is some real acting and some real stories and characters we’d like to know better. Mrs. Klump is a sweet woman, struggling to keep her family happy. Murphy’s portrayal is genuinely touching, even moving, reminiscient at times of Carol Burnett’s best moments as Eunice. The romance between Sherman and Denice had a lot of possibilities — two brilliant but insecure scientists trying to connect to each other. Murphy allows us a tantalizing glimpse of how tender Sherman is, and how much he longs for Denice — until the next hamster poop joke comes along.

Parents should know that in addition to the examples given above, the movie includes many, many gross and raunchy episodes, including a harsh portrayal of the sexuality of middle-aged and elderly people. When the grandmother grabs a man for a big, sloppy kiss, he throws up.

Families who see this movie should talk about how we control our impulses, and about how understanding and accepting all of our thoughts and feelings is the first step in letting them help us instead of getting in our way. Families can also talk about how the people we love can help us feel better about ourselves.

Families who enjoy this movie may also like “Kind Hearts and Coronets,” in which Alec Guinness plays seven members of the same family.