Unlike the MPAA we do not assign
one
inscrutable rating based on age, but 3 objective ratings for SEX/NUDITY, VIOLENCE/GORE
and PROFANITY on a scale of 0 to 10, from lowest to highest,
depending on quantity and context.
A boy (Alex D. Linz) who's just starting junior high finds
out his family is relocating. So he decides that this is the perfect opportunity for
payback against school bullies and a dishonest school official. But then he finds out that
his family is not moving after all, and now he needs to clean up all the messes he has
created. Also with Zena Grey, Larry Miller, Josh Peck and Amber Valletta. [1:26]
SEX/NUDITY 3 - A boy fantasizes about the girl next door a few times and
once they pucker up to kiss. A boy and girl hold hands. A room full of boys seems
attracted to their teacher as she walks by with a jar of pheromones (they all watch her
and make moaning noises). A young woman and boy dance on a table in a crowded ice-cream
shop. A boy kisses a teacher's hand. A young woman holds a boy around the shoulders and
plays with his hair. A boy talks to another boy about a girl liking him. A young woman is
shown in tight cleavage revealing tops, tight pants and short skirts. A poster reading:
"I'm wearing a thong" hangs behind a principal's desk.
VIOLENCE/GORE 4 - There are several scenes of bullying: A bully terrorizes
new junior high students: he drags one boy out of school, tosses him in a puddle of mud,
holds him under a wood chipper (he gets covered in saw dust), and then tosses him in a
dumpster. A group of young people surrounds two bullies and toss them in a dumpster. A
bully threatens a boy who is lying on the ground and a bully gives a boy a swirly
off-screen. A boy is grabbed by a bully and locked in a glass case. A bully takes lunch
money from a boy, and threatens other boys and girls for money. An ice-cream truck runs
over a boy's bike, and an ice-cream man flings ice-cream on a boy's shoe. An ice-cream
man's eyes glow red, and with his truck chases a boy riding his bike (this happens several
times). A boy is cut off by an ice-cream truck, and he throws a newspaper which hits the
ice-cream truck driver in the head. Several of these sequences involving ice-cream are
within dreams: A man is hit in the chest by flying ice-cream and falls to the ground, and
a boy and young woman are hit with flying ice-cream; a boy rides his bike through heavily
trafficked streets, jumps a ramp and the ice-cream man fires ice-cream at him; and a boy
and a man fight with Kung Fu moves using newspapers and ice-cream scoops as weapons -- the
man is hit in the crotch with a newspaper and punched in the face, and he flies through
the air. A man drives a bulldozer toward a group of young people and through the gates of
an animal shelter. A man and a boy fight in a junk yard, with each breaking something that
the other wants, and grabbing and shaking each other; eventually they are both deluged
with melted ice-cream from a truck held over their heads. A man is chased through the
streets by animals because his breath spray is laced with pheromones. A boy is hit in the
face by a door and is knocked to the floor, and we hear a thud when a boy falls from a low
window. A boy disrupts a class by jumping across desks, and kicking a globe across the
room. A man hits books out of a boy's hands and threatens him verbally, a man grabs a boy
by the shirt and tosses him into a chair, and a man drags a boy by the shirt collar and
locks him in a janitor's closet. A man tries to knock a door down by running into it; he
then hits it with a variety of tools. A boy flings mashed potatoes hitting another boy in
the face and starting a huge food fight in the school cafeteria. A boy flips over a fence
and lands on the back of an ostrich. Three young people break into a school at night,
creeping through the vents and are nearly caught by the janitor. A man falls back off his
chair and a girl trips and falls while walking down the aisle of a school bus. A man
flails around when a squirrel climbs down his jacket and into his pants (we hear a crunch
when it reaches his crotch). A monkey jumps on a man's back and he falls to the ground
landing, face first, in a pile of mashed potatoes and chocolate pudding. A boy holds on to
the door of a van, and kicks and screams as his mother pulls on his legs to get him to go
to school. A boy is terrified by the sight and the song of a stuffed frog, he shakes and
cries saying the frog is going to eat him, and in one scene he hides under a bench in
fear. A man crashes his car off-screen. A boy uses a urinal in a bathroom (we don't hear
or see anything, as he stands in front of it). There is some scatological and gross-out
humor: a reference is made to a boy smelling like a diaper, a boy picks up a soda can off
a bus floor and drinks the last sip, a boy picks spaghetti off another boy who has been in
a dumpster and nearly eats it, a boy flatulates, a boy burps, and a man sniffs a jock
strap. A boy vomits off-screen but we hear it and see the gooey residue on his face (and
he remarks that "that was a waste of a perfectly good chili").
the review continues below...
PROFANITY 3 - 3 mild obscenities, some name-calling. [profanity glossary]
A CAVEAT: We've gone through several editorial changes since we
started covering films in 1992 and some of our early standards were
not as stringent as they are now. We therefore need to revisit many
older reviews, especially those written prior to 1998 or so; please
keep this in mind if you're consulting a review from that period.
While we plan to revisit and correct older reviews our resources are
limited and it is a slow, time-consuming process.
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