Our entire family recently watched an R-rated movie. I rented it with full knowledge of its rating (maybe even in defiance of it) and brought it home to watch with the whole tribe. I was fairly certain that the girls and my husband and I would be riveted (see my previous article To G or PG for background). Our son, I thought, would last about five minutes, get bored, and move on to Playmobile or Lego. In this, I was mistaken. He watched, even declared he enjoyed, the whole thing.

I imagine you wonder why would I allow my 10- and 9-year-old girls and my 4-year-old son to watch an R-rated movie. Why is it rated R, and what would a 4-year-old boy find to enjoy about it? The film in question is a documentary titled Shut Up and Sing, whose subject, The Dixie Chicks, is a band our family loves. The Chicks are a multi-Grammy winning band who alienated a large portion of their core audience when lead singer Natalie Maines declared, at a London concert on the eve of America's invasion of Iraq, the band was "ashamed that the president of the United States (was) from Texas." This off-the-cuff comment precipitated a storm of controversy and violent backlash of vast proportions. Just the stuff for family movie night.

Shut Up and Sing earned its rating by including, intact, the language and conversations of a trio of married, adult, female musicians engaged in living their private lives and saving their public careers without buckling under the pressure of, among other things, demands for a sincere act of contrition, death threats (no exaggeration) and commercial annihilation. Care to speculate on the popular, if R-rated, vernacular used? Frankly, it's all language our kids have heard me, not their dad, use on occasion. I speculate they are not the only innocents to have been so exposed. Also, twice, blowjobs are mentioned. Had Mr. Wonderful and I gasped, hit the off button and said, "Enough!" I'm sure we would still be fielding the questions. Instead, we said nothing, did nothing, and the kids have not once, then or now, asked a thing about it. And really, the rating, while attention-getting and impossible to ignore in a “family friendly” movie recommendation, has little to do with the substance of this documentary.

We would have happily paid to see this excellent film in the theatre but ended up seeing it at home, which was, in the end, a blessing. We did not fast forward thru any of it, but we replayed a lot. Not only is the concert, rehearsal and studio footage fun and interesting, but it's not every day that public figures with everything to lose stand up for their principles (not to mention their constitutional rights) under fierce bullying and intense personal and commercial pressure. I consider the Chicks admirable role models, for both their music and bravery, and could not pass up the opportunity to share with the kids an object lesson in something we tell them all the time, that the right thing to do is not always the easy thing to do.

Finally, our son did end up enjoying Shut Up and Sing because, as he reminded me just this afternoon, he loves the Dixie Chicks "more than 'The End of The World' [REM] and 'Big Locomotive' [The Grateful Dead]." And that's saying something. Another child of four might not be the music lover ours is; another family might not be ready or willing to overlook R language. If, however, your family members are fans of good music, can stand some cussing and are even remotely interested in civil liberties, I highly suggest renting and watching Shut Up and Sing.

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Sue Harvey

Sue "Mom on Film" Harvey is a mother of three who shares her passion for film with bi-weekly, family-friendly movie recommendations.

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