Rating: PG, for some mild thematic elements.
This sequel to the 2011 family film Dolphin Tale is, like its predecessor, exceedingly earnest and harmless entertainment. But there’s something sort of sweet and quaint about that. Winter, the dolphin who was rescued in the first movie, now lives at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium in Florida and is learning to function with a high-tech prosthetic tail. But her status there is in jeopardy when — spoiler alert! — her elderly companion dolphin dies. I brought my almost-5-year-old son with me to the screening and the dolphin’s death — as well as the devastated reactions from the teens who worked with her — upset him. But for the most part, this is a film that?s all about teamwork and uplift. Fine for the whole family.
Rating: PG-13, for intense sequences of violence, gunplay and action throughout.
The second Captain America movie is chock full of shootouts, martial-arts butt kicking and the kind of prolonged, punishing brawls in which only physically altered specimens can engage. It’s pretty much what you’d expect from an effects-laden blockbuster based on a comic-book hero. But beneath the well-staged mayhem, the film ponders much darker themes, as well as a debate over freedom vs. security. This time, Cap (Chris Evans) must uncover a conspiracy within the secret government agency S.H.I.E.L.D. with the help of Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson). There’s an incredibly violent car chase that causes a ton of damage involving their boss, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), as well as a climactic battle in the skies above Washington featuring massive machines created to take out millions of people. This is probably fine for mature tweens and older.
Rating: PG-13, for frenetic gunplay, action and violence throughout, language, sexual menace and drug material.
The final film Paul Walker completed before dying in an auto accident in November 2013 is an English-language remake of the French cult hit District B13. It’s also a super-duper violent PG-13 movie full of thrilling chases, heavily armed goons, fiery explosions and elaborately choreographed martial-arts battles. Walker stars as an undercover officer who must infiltrate a seedy housing project in a crime-infested, dystopian Detroit. Walker’s character teams up with a longtime resident of the buildings (Parkour founder David Belle, reprising his role from the original) to take down the drug kingpin who rules the place (Wu-Tang Clan?s RZA). Along the way, a beautiful young woman is kidnapped and placed in some sexually perilous situations. It’s really intense and mature, and probably only suitable for tweens and up.
