2011
85 minutes
rated PG
by Scott Mendelson
When I was quite a bit younger, I was always impressed by family films and/or kid-pics that acknowledged harsh truths of life and/or dealt frankly with darker subject matters. Of course, in today's marketplace, what we consider 'kids films' are basically the same PG-13 rated blockbusters that everyone else sees and/or the mass-market PG-rated animated pictures that attempt to entertain adults and kids at the same time. Since there are fewer and fewer big-studio films made for adults, it stands to reason that there is less of a need for explicitly kid-friendly movies of this nature. Nonetheless, if you have young kids and want some middle ground between Cars 2 and Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Snowmen will likely fit the bill. It is a throwback of sorts to the kind of movie that seemed tailor-made to be screened in elementary schools during 'movie day'. It is a product of an age where kids still needed movies that were appropriate for them and didn't always have to talk down to them.
