Morgan Freeman returns as Dr. Alex Cross in this prequel to “Kiss the Girls.” Like the original, this movie has a nursery rhyme title and centers on a kidnapped girl. This time it is not a serial killer, just a madman inspired by the Lindburgh kidnap case, trying to make a name for himself with the crime of the new century. And this time the kidnap victim is not a woman but a little girl, the daughter of a United States Senator.

Freeman, as always, is a pleasure to watch, bringing a complexity and weight to every scene that almost makes up for a dumb plot. But even he cannot make up for Monica Potter, who replaces Ashley Judd as Freeman’s co-star, and who is as bland as a Barbie doll, and with an even blanker facial expression.

Potter plays Jazzie, a Secret Service agent assigned to a fancy school for the children of big shots and rich people. It’s the kind of place where every desk has an internet hookup and there are more Secret Service agents around than hall monitors. Let me just point out here that the Secret Service does not protect the children of Senators or even Senators themselves, who are in a different branch of government. We’ll give them some leeway for movie logic on that one. But there are some lapses, like having the President of Russia living in Washington, DC, that are inexcusably preposterous.

Jazzie blames herself when Megan (Mikka Boorem) is taken, and she is grateful when Alex Cross, himself recovering from a disastrous sting operation, wants her to work with him. They track down the kidnapper and prevent a second child from being taken. And there are shoot-outs, chases, and near-misses, some well staged. But the final twist is just plain dumb, and neither the performers nor the script’s explanation of the characters’ motivation have the panache to carry it off. No one could, especially when they resort to that hoariest of clichés, the good guy figuring it all out and then going out to the deserted location where it is all happening all by himself! At least they spare us the long explanation by the villain about the master plan.

Parents should know that the movie is very violent, with many deaths and some of the brightest-colored blood I have ever seen spurting in a movie. Characters use strong language. Many people may be upset by seeing children in peril, though Megan and her friend are strong, brave, loyal, and very smart. Other characters betray the trust of people who have been good to them, which may be disturbing to some viewers.

Families who see the movie should talk about what people do when they have to pick themselves up and go on following a disaster. They may also want to talk about how we decide whom we will trust and how we find reserves of strength when we are in scary situations. They should discuss Cross’ statement that everyone is born with a gift or gets good at something and “you don’t betray that.” They might also want to talk about whether criminals really are motivated by the prospect of fame, and whether there is or ever will be again a hero as universally adored as Lindburgh was.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “Kiss the Girls” and an enjoyably dumb movie with a similar theme, Masterminds, a kind of “Die Hard” in a fancy prep school, with Patrick Stewart as the bad guy. Next to this one, “Masterminds” looks like “Citizen Kane.”

Antionio Salieri (F. Murray Abraham in an Oscar-winning performance), the court composer, should have been Mozart. He followed all the rules, worked hard, and cared deeply. Music was his life. Mozart (Tom Hulce) arrives, a bawdy, bratty, foolish boy whose music could enchant the angels. Salieri, ironically the only one who understands music well enough to realize Mozart’s genius, is consumed with jealousy.

Teens will be interested to learn that this movie was written by a man whose twin brother was for a time the more commercially successful of the two, both playwrights, which surely influenced his choice of subject and his approach.

Families who enjoy this movie should see Ingmar Bergman’s movie version of Mozart’s The Magic Flute.

“Amélie” is filled with whimsical charm the way that a chocolate soufflé is filled with air.

Amélie (Audrey Tatou) grows up the lonely child of parents who do not know how to show their love for her. She becomes a thoughtful, quiet, observant girl who decides to change the lives of those around her, opening hearts to the adventure that is waiting for them, taking revenge on a cruel grocer, bringing together a couple who are afraid to show their longing for each other, and bringing the outside world to a reclusive painter and to her own father. But will she do for herself what she has done for others and find love with the mysterious collector of rejected photo booth pictures? And who is the “ghost” who appears in so many of the torn photos?

Writer-director Jean-Pierre Jeunet gives the story a feeling somewhere between fairy tale and documentary. His behind-the-scenes glimpses of the characters’ likes and dislikes – from cleaning out a toolbox and getting fingers pruny in the bath to sticking a hand in a barrel of grain and cracking the sugar on a crème brulée — are deliciously particular and somehow very touching. Audrey Tatou is just right as Amélie, a perfect gamine in a Lulu haircut.

Parents should know while the movie is like a fairy tale, there are some graphic moments. One character works in a porn shop, and we see him surrounded by sex toys. There are comic but explicit sexual situations. There is a reference to suicide and a child’s mother is killed in an accident.

Families who see this movie should talk about why Amélie wants to help people from a distance and is reluctant to show herself to the man who attracts her. Why do so many people need outside help to find happiness? Is there someone you would like to help?

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy another Parisian fantasy, Zazie Dans Le Metro.

American Outlaws” is a rock and roll western for the MTV era. It may be a little on the dumb and cheesy side, but it does not take itself or its characters too seriously and it has enough cute cowboys, shoot-outs, and romance to remind us how much we’ve missed seeing westerns.

Once we abandon any pretense of historical accuracy, we can settle back and enjoy the story — more of a fable — about the infamous Jesse James and the James-Younger gang. According to this movie, Jesse James was just misunderstood. All he wanted was to come back from the Civil War and farm his land. But those reliable western meanies, the railroad men, want that land and will do anything to get it. According to this version, James and his brother Frank joined with their cousins, the Younger brothers, were not bad guys at all. They were something of a 19th century Robin Hood, robbing from the railroads to give to the people who have lost their land.

There are some good action scenes and solid production values. The script is unimpressive. What makes the movie work as well as it does is the performance of Irish actor Colin Farrell, whose critically acclaimed but little seen performance in “Tigerland” built up a lot of anticipation for his first starring role in a major American film. He more than lives up to that promise, giving Jesse James a charm and all-American open-heartedness that make it easy for us to accept him as the hero. And this movie really is about the outlaw as rock star. People seem positively honored to be robbed by them, and the man who is charged with capturing him says admiringly, “If I was to design the perfect outlaw band, this is the gang I’d create,” and “I’d just as soon kill you, Jesse, but chasing you takes up too much of my time.”

Parents should know that the movie features a great deal of western-style violence, including a Civil War battle scene with many injuries and deaths. There are several shoot-outs and major characters are killed, including a parent. The main characters are robbers who kill when they must to get away with the money. They seem to believe that since the money belongs to the railroad, it is all right, even righteous, to steal it. They enjoy their fame as outlaws and even write to the newspapers to make sure that their story is properly told. There is some strong cowboy language, including mild references to prostitutes. A young woman makes it clear that she will not have sex with the man she loves until they are married. A scene takes place in a saloon, and a boy takes a drink.

Families who see this movie should talk about how the movie makes us root for the robbers. Would it be possible to tell this story from a different point of view? Families should do some research on the real Jesse James. There is a lot of information on the Internet, and http://www.crimelibrary.com/americana/jesse/ is a good place to start. Why is he such a fascinating and romantic figure, more than a century after his death?

There have been at least a dozen movies about Jesse James, including two starring his son, Jesse James, Jr., two starring WWII hero Audie Murphy, two with “The Lone Ranger’s” Clayton Moore, one with Rob Lowe from television’s “The West Wing,” one with Oscar-winner Robert Duvall, and even one starring Harris Yulin, who plays the mean railroad guy in this version. Kids may also be familiar with the WWF character called “Road Dogg Jesse James.” Families who enjoy this movie might enjoy seeing some other takes on the James-Younger gang. They will also enjoy two other modern westerns with action, romance, and humor, “Silverado” and “Cat Ballou.

Teenagers will want to see this movie because it is raunchy and gross. But like the original, the gross and raunchy moments, though frequent, are less important than the movie’s core sensibility, which is sweetly old-fashioned.

Let me be very clear. It very, very, raunchy and very, very, gross, with references to every kind of humiliation, sexual act, and bodily function. No one will call it wholesome. However, in the end, almost every sexual encounter is in a context of respect and sincere affection.

When we left Jim (Jason Biggs) and his pals at the end of the first movie, they had just achieved their ambition of having sex by graduation. This movie begins a year later, as they are finishing their first year in college and reuniting for what they hope will be a wild summer. They rent a house on the beach, put a keg on the porch, and do everything they can to entice bikini-clad ladies to join them. They talk a lot about how much crazy fun they want to have, but they do very little about it. Oz (Chris Klein) is devoted to his girlfriend (Mena Suvari), who is in Europe for the summer. Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas) is still dreaming about his night with Stifler’s mother (Jennifer Coolidge), and spends the summer preparing to see her again by learning about tantric sex. Kevin (Thomas Ian Nicholas), who could not bring himself to say “I love you” to his girlfriend (Tara Reid) in the first movie, is surprised to find that he is hurt and even a little lost after she has moved on. Jim, who was never able to get together with exchange student Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth) in the first movie, is overjoyed to hear that she will be coming to visit him at the end of the summer. His top priority is to become more expert in bed, so he visits the “band camp geek” he had sex with on graduation night to get some pointers.

Only Stifler (Seann William Scott) continues to act like an unrestrained id, and even so, the closest he gets to having sex is when two women trick him into kissing Jim by promising to have sex with each other and let him watch. As in the first movie, it ends with one big night in which each of the characters more or less gets what he was looking for.

This is not a particularly good movie, but it is not a particularly bad one, either. I give it credit for treating its female characters like real people comfortable with their own sexuality, practically revolutionary for movies of this genre. I also give it credit for completely avoiding the usual sitcom-style painfully artificial mix-ups and misunderstandings. And there are some very funny moments, especially those featuring Eugene Levy as Jim’s magnificently unhip but understanding and loving father.

Parents should know that the movie features dozens of gross and raunchy moments, with references to anal sex, oral sex, tantric sex, masturbation, homosexuality, and bathroom humor. Characters engage in underage drinking, including trying to get girls drunk so that they will agree to sex. The atmosphere and dialogue may be completely irresponsible, but the behavior is not. As in the first, all major characters are white, which adds to the artificiality of the settings.

Any parent whose teenager sees this movie should see it, too, so that you can have some sense of the messages he or she is getting about making sexual choices, and have the opportunity to comment. You can begin by agreeing that Jim’s dad is dorky, and then talk about how a non-dorky parent (if there is such a thing) might approach these issues.

Families should talk about the way that Jim’s dad is completely supportive, even when Jim humiliates himself by mistaking superglue for lubricant and has to be rushed to the hospital. Jim’s dad does not criticize him for what is clearly a humiliating experience. He just reassures Jim that he loves him and is proud of him. Families might also want to talk about how people cope with the feeling that they do not know what they are doing and must be making terrible mistakes when they first become sexually involved, and the importance of selecting sexual partners with whom they can share truly intimate moments. And they will want to discuss teen drinking and other substance abuse issues as well.

Families who enjoy this movie should see the first one, and should compare them to the 1980’s equivalent (the “Porky’s” series) and the 1960’s equivalent (the “Beach Party” series).