Letters to Juliet

image for Letters to Juliet

Short takes

Lacks interest under 8, Parental guidance recommended to 13, due to themes.

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This topic contains:

  • overall comments and recommendations
  • details of classification and consumer advice lines for Letters to Juliet
  • a review of Letters to Juliet completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 13 May 2010.

Overall comments and recommendations

Children under 8 Lacks interest for this age group
Children aged 8-13 Parental guidance recommended due to themes
Children over the age of 13 OK for this age group

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Australian Government Classification Board and the associated consumer advice lines. Other classification advice (OC) is provided where the Australian film classification is not available.

Name of movie: Letters to Juliet
Classification: PG
Consumer advice lines: Infrequent coarse language
Length: 105 minutes

ACCM review

This review of the movie contains the following information:

A synopsis of the story

Every year thousands of visitors flock to Verona in Italy to visit the famous Capulet House and leave letters to Juliet in the wall beneath the balcony. Most of these letters are answered by the secretaries of Juliet, a voluntary organisation and part of the Juliet Club. Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) travels to Verona with her fiancé Victor (Gael Garcia Bernal) on what she had hoped would be a romantic early honeymoon. However she finds herself spending a lot of time alone as Victor pursues his business contacts. Sophie becomes intrigued with the Juliet Club and begins to assist them to answer letters.

While working with the Juliet Club Sophie discovers a letter written 50 years earlier wedged behind a loose brick. She writes to Claire (Vanessa Redgrave), the author of the letter, and is surprised when Claire arrives in Verona with her grandson Charlie (Christopher Egan). To Charlie’s dismay, Sophie has inspired Claire to search for the long lost love, Lorenzo, whom she left in Italy 50 years earlier. Finding him will be a challenge, as there are hundreds of men with that name in Italy, but Claire is undeterred.  Sophie persuades Claire to let her accompany her and, together with Charlie, they travel the beautiful Tuscany area in their quest to find Lorenzo.

Themesinfo

Children and adolescents may react adversely at different ages to themes of crime, suicide, drug and alcohol dependence, death, serious illness, family breakdown, death or separation from a parent, animal distress or cruelty to animals, children as victims, natural disasters and racism. Occasionally reviews may also signal themes that some parents may simply wish to know about.

Relationships

Use of violenceinfo

Research shows that children are at risk of learning that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution when violence is glamourised, performed by an attractive hero, successful, has few real life consequences, is set in a comic context and / or is mostly perpetrated by male characters with female victims, or by one race against another.

Repeated exposure to violent content can reinforce the message that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution. Repeated exposure also increases the risks that children will become desensitised to the use of violence in real life or develop an exaggerated view about the prevalence and likelihood of violence in their own world.

None of concern

Material that may scare or disturb children

Under fiveinfo

Children under five are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations.

Some children may be worried by a scene in which Sophie falls from the balcony onto the grass beneath.  She is unhurt.

Aged five to eightinfo

Children aged five to eight will also be frightened by scary visual images and will also be disturbed by depictions of the death of a parent, a child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters.

Children in this age group are also likely to be disturbed by the above mentioned scenes.

Aged eight to thirteeninfo

Children aged eight to thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic threats and dangers, violence or threat of violence and / or stories in which children are hurt or threatened.

Charlie mentions that his parents were killed in a car accident and that his Grandmother has brought him up.

Thirteen and overinfo

Children over the age of thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic physical harm or threats, molestation or sexual assault and / or threats from aliens or the occult.

None of concern

Product placement

None of concern

Sexual references

None of concern

Nudity and sexual activity

There is some nudity and sexual activity in this movie, including:

  • Some passionate kissing between Sophie and Charlie

Use of substances

There is some use of substances in this movie, including:

  • Drinking at a number of functions

Coarse language

There is some coarse language in this movie, including:

  • Oh my god
  • shit

In a nutshell

Letters to Juliet is a classic romantic movie set in the beautiful Tuscany countryside.  The cinematography is wonderful and so is Vanessa Redgrave as Claire.

The main messages from this movie are that you are never too old for love and that you should take hold of opportunities when they come along.

Values in this movie that parents may wish to reinforce with their children include:

  • the importance of love
  • following your heart

This movie could also give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children attitudes and behaviours, and their real-life consequences, such as

  • how putting a career first can jeopardise a relationship
  • beliefs about relationships before marriage