I am officially on summer hiatus from
The Big Bang Theory
. After a month of travel (I traveled every week for at least three days for the past month, including a trip to Paris, two trips to Denver, a trip to San Jose, St.Louis, and New York), I am home.
I am happy to be home. I am organizing my house, spending time alone, and spending time with my kids. I also have seen two movies in one week! That’s a lot for me, since I’ve seen maybe one a year for the past eight years.
I saw Iron Man III yesterday. I love comic books and comic book movies, and I loved the first two Iron Man movies and was very excited to see this one. Truth be told, it was not my favorite: too many plot lines, too much similarity of the lead character to Osama Bin Laden and I sort of felt like it was “too soon” for a movie about the War on Terror showing a lot of graphic stuff about terrorism. But I’m sensitive about terrorism stuff; I don’t know.
I should say that I don’t tend to be bothered by violence in movies in general and some of my favorite movies are very violent and graphic. Django, for example, and movies like
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
for example are terrific for me. So I don’t mind violence per se.
However.
The violence in Iron Man III was very… intense. It was a lot of point blank shootings and complicated killings, and although there was no blood and gore, I found it pretty disturbing. I casually glanced around the theater during one intense violent scene and I near shouted in dismay because there was a child there. He could not have been older than 10. He was with three adults, but he most certainly was well below 13 (the movie is rated PG-13). I was astounded.
First of all, I don’t care if there is no blood and gore, this movie was still violent enough to merit a higher age rating. This type of violence is not for 13-year-olds, in my opinion. Maybe we have problems with kids not understanding violence because from such a young age they are shown movies like this where violence is so bizarre and detached from reality. I don’t mean to sound like a fuddy-duddy, but I don’t know that a 13-year-old could see this movie and not be affected. And if they wouldn’t be, that also scares me.
Second, why did these people bring a child into the theater and stay? What made them think this was a movie to stay for when the violence got so emotionally intense? As in, torture and people begging for their lives and being shot at point blank range. Even if Iron Man III sounded like a good idea at first because–hey, it’s Iron Man and it’s a comic thing and it’s funny. But once you see this kind of violence, why do you stay?
Third, why do I feel like such an incredibly lame mom for writing this post? I know I can make my own choices and my kids have never been to the movies, much less have I ever turned on the TV for them, but should I have said something to these people in this child’s defense? Does it take a village in this case? I didn’t want to shame this family, but I also cannot fathom a young child sitting through that and not being affected negatively.
I rarely write posts with no “answer” or “moral” or “hopeful message of love and inspiration,” but I am flummoxed here, folks.
Flummoxed.
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