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Life as a House | 2001 | R | - 6.4.7

Kevin Kline plays a middle-aged architect who suddenly finds out that he has only four months to live. He decides to use that time to mend a broken relationship with his son and ex-wife by building his dream house. Also with Kristin Scott Thomas, Hayden Christensen, Mary Steenburgen and Jena Malone. [2:25]

SEX/NUDITY 6 - In a couple of scenes we see a young woman take off her clothes (we see them drop to the floor at her feet) and join a young man in a shower (we see their bare shoulders); once they begin to kiss and he ejaculates. A young man and an older woman have sex (he's on top of her thrusting); they are interrupted and we see her running out of the room nude from the back and the young man struggles to put on his clothes. A man and woman have sex and we see the comforter of the bed going up and down rhythmically. A man and woman kiss passionately and fall back onto a bed but are interrupted before anything else happens. A young man and woman kiss. A woman yells on the phone "You're driving me crazy. I want you in my bed right now." A young woman climbs into bed with a man and kisses him as an experiment. Two young men talk about one of them going to join a man in a car to perform sexual acts: we see the young man later as he gets out of the car with his pants around his ankles and his boxer shorts exposed. A young man showers and we see his silhouette through a fogged glass shower door and his bare chest when he opens the door (this happens a few times). A man showers outdoors and we see his bare buttocks before he wraps a towel around his waist. A woman tries on a bra and panties and looks in a mirror. A young woman rubs suntan lotion on a young man's back. A man walks out of his house to a cliff in his underwear and urinates over the edge (we hear the trickle); a young woman watches the man with interest. A man gets out of bed and wears only his jockey shorts. A woman kisses a man's face to wake him. A woman touches a man's head and face tenderly and when he tries to touch her back she pulls away. A man touches a woman's face and she snaps her teeth at him (he comments later that she bit him). We see a young man's bare chest and back while he sunbathes. A man and woman dance and hold each other, a man and a woman hug.

VIOLENCE/GORE 4 - A young man tries to commit suicide by hanging himself from a rod in a closet but it breaks and he falls hard to the floor. A horror movie on a TV shows a woman screaming and being slashed by a man with knives on his hand. A woman sits by an empty hospital bed and we assume that someone has died. A man talks about a car accident caused by his father who was driving drunk; during the accident his mother and the driver of the other car were killed, and a young girl was injured. A man talks about putting a gun to his father's head and wanting to kill him (the gun is a BB gun). A young man falls off a roof and crashes into a table splintering it (we hear later that he has several broken bones). A man collapses and falls hard to the ground on his back, a man collapses again and lands hard on his face, and a man has several attacks of debilitating pain. A woman finds a man unconscious and is fearful that he's dead. A man throws his son back on a bed and shakes him by the shoulders while yelling at him. A young man yells abusively at his mother and father, a young man grabs a man by the shirt and yells at him. A young man kicks his car in frustration, a man throws a tray of bread against a wall, a man kicks something and a young man slams a window. A man yells threats at a dog and chases him in his car and on foot several times. A man jumps off a high cliff into the ocean below, and a young man does the same thing. A dog urinates on a car's bumper and on a newspaper. A woman remarks that she hates her son, and a young man tells his mother and father that he hates them. A young man talks about needing to have a bowel movement. There are many scenes of demolition while a man tears down an old house. A man crushes architectural models in an office building with a stick (people run and scream in fear), and one of the models is being held by another man who yells while the model splinters. A young man has several piercings on his body. A man threatens to remove his son's piercing with a claw hammer.

LANGUAGE 7 - 19 F-words, 1 obscene hand gesture, 11 scatological terms, 2 sexual references, 5 anatomical terms, 1 derogatory term for homosexuals, 9 religious exclamations.

SUBSTANCE USE - Teenagers are shown smoking and doing drugs. We see one young man inhaling the chemical from a whipped cream canister.

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Divorce, teenage angst, drug use and abuse, male prostitution, cancer, the death of a parent, spousal abuse, drunk driving, snobbery, belittling your children, estranged fathers.

MESSAGE - You don't always get what you wish for.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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