Judy Moody and the NOT Bummer Summer

What’s it about?

Judy Moody is in year 3 at school and really looking forward to the summer holidays.  She has everything planned out and it will be a race between her and her friends to reach 100 points.  Things don’t go according to plan though when two of her best friends aren’t able to make it. Then to make it worse, Judy’s parents have to go and look after her Grandparents so won’t be taking Judy to California.

Judy and her younger brother Stink have to go and stay with their Aunt Opal instead. Things turn out better than she thought though as Aunt Opal is quite a carefree and fun loving person and she finds herself enjoying her holidays more than she thought she would.

What to look out for

Quite a bit of comic violence in this movie mostly done for laughs such as:

• Children fall and trip, and cars crash into things. No one is hurt.
• A woman drives wildly through the front yards of houses, one yard has a jumping castle with a child inside it.
• Children riding on a bike are almost hit by a car.
• A brother and sister fight, pushing and shouting at each other.

There are also some scenes which might scare younger kids such as:

• Film clips and photos of the yeti ‘Bigfoot’ are shown throughout the movie.
• A girl and her brother are walking in a dark, wooded area in the middle of the night when an opossum falls on her head.
• A horror movie which features zombies, one with an eye hanging out and another with a dismembered hand, scares Judy and her friend so that they throw their popcorn into the air and run out of the cinema screaming.

Moral of the Story

The message of the story is that having fun isn’t about ticking off points on a chart but enjoying the time you spend with your family and friends.