Not suitable under 13, not recommended 13-15 (Violence, disturbing scenes and themes, coarse language, drug use)
This topic contains:
Children under 13 | Not suitable due to violence, disturbing scenes and themes, coarse language and drug references. |
Children 13-14 | Not recommended due to violence, disturbing scenes and themes, coarse language and drug references. |
Children 15 and over | OK for this age group |
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: | Super 8 |
Classification: | M |
Consumer advice lines: | Science fiction themes, violence, coarse language and drug use |
Length: | 108 minutes |
This review of the movie contains the following information:
Thirteen-year-old Joe Lamb’s mother has been killed in a factory accident. Four months later, at the beginning of summer, Joe (Joel Courtney) and his friends Charles (Riley Griffiths), Preston (Zach Mills), Martin (Gabriel Basso), Carey (Ryan Lee) and Alice (Elle Fanning) sneak out at midnight to film part of Charles’ low-budget zombie film on Super 8 film. They witness a truck being driven by their biology teacher Dr Woodward (Glynn Turman) driving on to train tracks, crashing into an oncoming train and causing a derailment. Woodward survives, but warns the children to never speak of what they saw that night because they and their parents will be killed.
Air force personnel arrive to investigate the accident and in the following days strange things begin to happen in the town. People and pets disappear; electronics and parts of cars also go missing. Meanwhile, the military question Dr Woodward and kill him when he won’t cooperate.
Then Alice is abducted and the town is evacuated with surrounding fires being used as an excuse. The military take over the town and the children break into the school to search for any information that Dr Woodward may have had. They discover that the US government imprisoned, tortured and experimented on, an extraterrestrial being that crashed on Earth in 1958.
The children now work to find Alice and right past wrongs.
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.
Extraterrestrial life; death of a parent
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.
There is violence in this movie including:
Children under five are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations.
In addition to the above-mentioned violent scene, there area number of scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children under the age of five, including the following:
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 violent and distressing scenes
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.
Children in this age group are also likely to be disturbed by some of the above-mentioned scenes
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.
Younger children in this age group may also be disturbed by some of the above-mentioned scenes
None of concern
None of concern
None of concern
There is some use of substances in this movie, including:
There are some coarse language and putdowns in this movie, including:
Super 8 is a teen science fiction thriller with spectacular effects and sense of mystery. It tackles the themes of friendship, young love, single parenthood, the misunderstanding of adults, and how everyday people cope with encountering an extraordinary situation.
The main messages from this movie are
Values in this movie that parents may wish to reinforce with their children include:
This movie could also give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children attitudes and behaviours, and their real-life consequences, such as
Tip: Leave out the first A, An or The
Selecting an age will provide a list of movies with content suitable for this age group. Children may also enjoy movies selected via a lower age.
Content is age appropriate for children this age
Some content may not be appropriate for children this age. Parental guidance recommended
Content is not age appropriate for children this age
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