Talking to Kids about Movies

Rob Reiner's film Stand by Me (1986) Stand by Me (Rob Reiner, 1986) 

Film Friday

First, a quick prayer of thanksgiving: my father, who is responsible for my love of literature and film, underwent successful surgery on a blocked artery Tuesday. He had been experiencing sharp pains and a stent was installed. Such are the miracles of modern medicine that, by Thursday morning, he was back home and we were having phone conversations about books and movies once again.

Speaking of father-son movie discussions, today’s post is about how, when my three sons were growing up, I gained important insights by talking to them about the films we watched together. Justin, Darien, and Toby were always surprising me with their responses.

Particularly illuminating were films with ensemble casts. Two films we saw and discussed were Rob Reiner’s Stand by Me (1986) and Penny Marshall’s A League of their Own (1992). My opening question was generally, “Who did you like the best?” and we would go from there. Sometimes my boys preferred characters like themselves, sometimes they went for characters that had an anxiety they recognized, sometimes they liked characters that had qualities they aspired to. I could seldom predict ahead of time who they would choose.

I also would share why I liked a particular character best. They learned about me as I learned about them.

Stand by Me is a movie based on a Stephen King novel where four comrades embark on an overnight expedition to find a boy that has been killed. There is nothing particularly horrific about the film (it’s not that kind of Stephen King story), and one gets to know the characters well.

I predicted that Justin, my oldest, would relate to the writer in the group (the movie is told from his perspective decades later), but actually he chose Chris, the River Phoenix character, who is tough on the outside but surprisingly sensitive underneath. I think Justin, a very sensitive child himself, was eleven or twelve when we saw the film. He was finding his sensitivity under attack in middle school, and I think he appreciated how Chris is able to open up, despite pressures from his environment. It supported Justin’s own attempts to be true to himself.


Darien, who even as a kid was extremely accomplished, surprised me by identifying with Vern, the fat, bumbling kid. At first, this made no sense to me. But Darien has always liked clear guidelines—he is someone who plays by the rules—and Vern is very sensitive to rules. For instance, I believe he balks at going over a railway trestle (and then is proved right when they are nearly run over by a train). He also objects to wading through a marsh (and then is proved right when they are swarmed by leeches). Darien, who had been pudgy when a toddler but wasn’t so by this time, nevertheless recognized some of himself in Vern.

Toby surprised me as well by naming Teddy, a boy with a crazy streak who has an abusive father. Toby now says he suspects he was kicking against the way we saw him as a docile youngest son. Because Toby was growing up in the shadow of his two high performing older brothers, we didn’t always give him credit for having a mind of his own. Identifying with the character who kicks against the rules and acts outside the box may have reflected how Toby was working to carve out an identity for himself. He didn’t have to be like Justin and Darien.

Toby’s response to Teddy also clued me in to the fact that Toby had some anger issues.  I had been closing my eyes to this, probably because anger frightened me.

I was surprised as well by their responses to A League of Their Own, about a women’s baseball league formed during World War II. I correctly predicted only Darien, who identified with the younger sister Kit. Like Darien, Kit is a classic second child, always fiercely competing with her older sister Dottie whereas Dottie, played by Geena Davis, wonders what all the fuss is about. (I, as an oldest child, identified with Dottie.) When, at the end of the film, the two of them have a collision at the plate (Dottie being the catcher, Kit an opposing baserunner), Kit burns with a little more fire and knocks the ball out of Dottie’s hand. That was Darien, always furious that he couldn’t compete on equal terms with a brother who had a three-year head start.

Justin, however, did not choose the older sister, as I thought he would. Rather he chose the Rosie O’Donnell character, I think because he liked the way she was forthright and spoke her mind. These were traits that Justin aspired to.

And Toby, just as he had liked the cut-up character in Stand by Me, also liked the cut-up character here, played by Madonna. Toby is the funniest Bates (the rest of us can be terribly earnest) and appreciated her sense of humor.

I hope it doesn’t sound like I was constantly putting my children on the analyst’s couch when I was raising them (like that dreadful father in What about Bob, a film we all enjoyed together). The talkes were less formal that that. In fact, they felt like a game. Movies gave us an enjoyable way of processing experiences.

But in having these conversations, I was also doing my job as a parent, which is to get to know one’s kids as well as one can so as to offer them appropriate support and guidance. Now that Darien and Toby are in their twenties, we continue talking about films in these rich ways. Trained for years in the conversation, they help me understand my own responses to films.

Of course, teaching people how to interpret their responses to stories is what I do for a living so I may be particularly good at it. But any parent can start. Just ask your child about a favorite scene or character and make sure you ask for specific details. Then listen well.

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