Ramona and Beezus...

… A Review. (Spoilers, as always).

Yesterday, Phil and I had an opportunity to go out… almost alone… (Miah is still rather “Mommy dependant”). We decided to take in a movie, and since “The Last Airbender” is already gone from our theater, and we didn’t feel inclined to see the animated, “Despicable Me”, we were left with “Ramona and Beezus”… I have to admit, I was happy, because that’s what I really wanted to see anyway…

And I was not disappointed. At all.

Let me begin by saying that although this particular film was 100% acceptable to me as something I will show my children… soon… really soon… it was really not a kids’ movie. Ramona was adorable, and her antics will certainly keep the kids’ attention. There are also some valuable life lessons for siblings that I hope won’t be lost on my kids… especially my oldest two… But as an adult… and as an adult who has experienced some of the situations that ran through the plot of this movie… simply put, I loved it.

Ramona and Beezus is a comedy… as was evident to me by the fact that there were some scenes that were so ridiculously funny I really had to consciously stop myself from laughing long after everyone else in the theater was done. It is a comedy for real people… with real families… and real kids. It was funny, because I could see it happening to me, and it’s always funnier when other people’s kids get stuck upside-down on the monkey bars… or make tiaras out of burrs… or tie-dye the neighbors’ vehicle.

But in a lot of ways, Ramona and Beezus was a drama, too. A drama for real people… with real families… and real kids. I can’t say that I cried (which is saying a lot… pregnancy hormones must finally be out of my body some four months later), but I can say that I related to the ups and downs of the Quimby family. I related to the big things… but I related to the small things, too… And I had to stop and wonder why it really is funnier when a baby dumps food on her head than when a 3rd grader does… and if I would yell at my child if she fell through the living room ceiling.

I loved that Ramona took the worst school picture ever… and that someone always either had Roberta in a baby carrier or was toting the baby monitor… and that Beezus compassionately helped her sister through the death of a loved pet, even after Ramona had just set the kitchen on fire and ruined Beezus’ love life… on speakerphone! I loved that we could revisit music from the early 90s and that plastic gumball machine rings have sentimental value. And I even loved that we leave the Quimby family with a new addition, a ziplock bag full of toothpaste, a stack of bills, and two part time jobs… and they’re happier than they were when we found them.

So stop reading this, already, and get out and go see this movie! It’s rare that such a gem is found anymore in the land of sticky floors and hundred dollar popcorn!

Lisa

PS For those of you who use plugged in movie reviews or know that I use plugged in and rely heavily on their reviews to determine what we will see, I have to make a couple of notes. The primary reason I didn’t feel comfortable taking the kids to see “Ramona and Beezus” without first previewing it was the “spiritual content” section of plugged in’s review. Having now seen the film, myself, I can say that I honestly felt like everything mentioned here was very childishly appropriate (from ancient burial grounds to cats with 9 lives). I also initially had some concern about Ramona’s reference to Jesus (after reading the review) only to find that it was not only perfectly contextual, but in fact endearing…