Negotiating the Thanksgiving Theater Trip

I love the fact that we're getting so many more prestige pictures in October, movies like "Gravity" and "Captain Phillips" that have been doing very well at the box office. However, this leaves me with a little bit of a dilemma this year. You see, Thanksgiving weekend has become something of a magnet for would-be blockbusters over the last few years, and the prestige pictures are getting edged out. "Gravity" will be in its ninth weekend of release by Thanksgiving weekend, and difficult to find. "Captain Phillips" will be in week eight, and probably even scarcer because it didn't do as much business. This worries me, because these are my best bets for "older parent friendly movies" to take Mom and Dad to during Thanksgiving weekend.

Thanksgiving has always been a movie weekend in or family. I have very fond memories of seeing Disney films like "Beauty and the Beast" and "Aladdin" with older cousins who herded us all out of the house for a Friday or Saturday matinee, and did my own share of herding when I was old enough. There were a lot of James Bond films in the 90s, various historical dramas, Zhang Yimou films, and other Oscar bait when it was just my immediate family, since my parents aren't big on blockbusters. This year is going to be one of those Thanksgivings, with most of the younger cousins grown up or planning to be away for the holiday. But as I'm looking at the upcoming schedule of holiday releases for films that are Mom and Dad appropriate, I worry that I may be in for some trouble here.

I've discussed on this blog before that my parents love movies, but their preferences tend to skew very old-fashioned. Last year was fine with "Life of Pi," a nice adventure spectacle with a respectably mature storyline. Or else we might have gone to "Lincoln" or "Skyfall." This year, there will be no James Bond to bail me out and there's not a lot of Oscar contenders in the mix. I'm looking at a sea of effects-heavy science fiction and fantasy films, exactly the sort of thing that my mother is likely to dismiss as "silly" and my father will reject as being "for kids." So no "Thor," no "Hunger Games: Catching Fire," and no "Ender's Game." If it were just my mother, "Frozen" would be an option, because she loves musicals and never had a problem taking us to Disney cartoons. Dad, not so much.

I'm also worried about content. Films like "The Counselor" and "Blue is the Warmest Color" are out, way too graphic for them to handle. Spike Lee's "Oldboy" should be tamer than the Korean original, but still too violent and intense to consider. "Homefront" with Jason Statham is out for similar reasons. "12 Years a Slave" and "All is Lost" are probably going to be too heavy and depressing viewing. Nearly all the comedies are out for potential crude language and sex. "Last Vegas" and "Delivery Man" are both only rated PG-13, but considering their plots revolve around a a lot of potentially illicit behavior and you can get away with a lot with a PG-13 these days, I'd rather be safe than squirming awkwardly in my seat the entire time.

So what's left? If "Gravity" and "Captain Phillips" are gone from theaters, I'm hoping that I can find "Nebraska" or "Inside Llewyn Davis," which should both be in limited runs by then. "Dallas Buyers Club" is a firm maybe. "Escape Plan," weirdly enough, is also an option. Arnold and Sly may be as silly as superheroes in their own way, but they're still grounded enough in reality to balance that out. Historical movies like "The Book Thief" and "The Fifth Estate" usually go over well. I'm not particularly keen on seeing either of these, but one does what one must. One year not too long ago, the iffy George W. Bush biopic "W." was the only thing Dad was interested in seeing, so that's what we watched.

Picking films at Christmas would be a lot easier. Then I'd have "Saving Mr. Banks," "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty," "Grudge Match," "47 Ronin," "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom," and a ton of smaller releases to work with. George Clooney's "Monuments Men" would have been a pretty much perfect pick, and it's too bad it's been delayed. There's a lot I'm looking forward to seeing this season, and I expect it's going to be a great Oscar race, but just thinking about going with my parents to watch anything makes me paranoid. Too dark? Too silly? Too raunchy? Too avant-garde? Too much violence? Too much strong language? Too much CGI?

I'm sure we'll figure out something, but maybe we should just stay in and rent Les Miz again.
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