Snowmen: Movie Review

I was invited to preview the movie "Snowmen."  At first I thought it would be a cute animated film with talking moving snowmen like the one on "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer."  Instead it is about a boy who sets out to break a world record to build the most snowmen in a day.  He wants to do something important that he will be remembered by.  

My Thoughts:  There was a super disgusting part near the beginning when a boy blows a huge slimy snot onto another boy's face.  My stomach literally turned.  Then there were suspenseful and frightening parts, especially when three boys find a dead body in the snow.  My oldest child had trouble going to bed that night because of it.  There was a lot of name calling and bullying throughout the movie.  And when the kids talk about the afterlife some of their ideas were very confusing to my kids. We were very close to turning the movie off since my boys (7 and 4) were losing interest, but we kept it on and the ending was surprisingly touching.  I have to admit there were even a few tears in my eyes.  There is a twist at the end that I won't spoil for you, but I was surprised at how the events actually unfolded.  It wasn't all completely predictable.

My boys liked the snowball fights the best.  They were very interested in the dead man and his gravesite and asked a lot of questions for the next two days.

My husband thought it was "kind of cheesy."  He actually fell asleep through part of it.  But he did think there were some good lessons about friendship that could be learned.  

Overall, I would not recommend this movie for young children.  I would say wait for it to come out on Netfilx or on DVD.  However, if you're looking for a low key, kind of cheesy, feel good movie this could be a good one for a family outing.  But, if you haven't seen "Dolphin Tale" yet, watch that first!  Dolphin Tale is excellent!  

So far I've been able to preview two free movies with my family before they came out.  If you're interested in being invited to preview movies go to www.homeschool.com and sign up to be a product tester.  We were also invited, by the Home School Legal Defense Association, to watch Dolphin Tale in the theater for free before it was released. 

You can sign up to get their e-mails here:    https://secure.hslda.org/hslda/elert/account.asp?Process=Subscribe