Raise Your Voice Hot

Raise Your Voice is a much heavier movie than I expected. The audience will cry frequently without many laughs for balance. A lot of weighty subjects are covered that can be used to open a dialogue with your child: death and grieving of a loved one, sneaking out of the house, lying to parents, drunk driving, following your dreams, going to a new school, moving to a big city, not being accepted by peers, helping those less fortunate, first love, hard work, betrayal, competition, and alcohol abuse. I’m sure there’s more.

However, in a movie targeted to Hilary’s ‘tween fans. I was uncomfortable with a few things. Most horrifying is when adults coerce Christian/goody-two shoes Terry to lie to her strict (but not abusive) father in an elaborate scheme. In carrying out The Big Lie, Terry’s mother puts her teen-age daughter on a train by herself to big, scary, dangerous Los Angeles (their depiction) where she has to get around town on her own. In another set of instances, a confusing message is sent to the audience – Terry and her brother are struck by a drunk driver and her brother dies; but later, in a stressful situation one of the adults comments, "I need a drink." In another scene, Terry’s boyfriend shows up drunk and there’s no real comment on it. Considering this movie is targeting kids, the message that drinking is just a part of life was concerning to me. The ‘tween girls in the audience seemed to really like the movie. I would not take kids under age nine to Raise Your Voice.