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Rio | 2011 | G | - 2.3.1
A rare blue Macaw (voiced by Jesse Eisenberg) is discovered in a small town in Minnesota where he has been raised dutifully by a woman (voiced by Leslie Mann) since she found him as a young bird. When they travel back to his home in Rio in order to unite him with the only remaining female blue Macaw (voiced by Anne Hathaway) they are preyed upon by thieves. Also with the voices of George Lopez, Tracy Morgan, Jemaine Clement, Rodrigo Santoro and Will.i.am. Directed by Carlos Saldanha. [1:36]
SEX/NUDITY 2 - A male bird flirts with his bird wife, she swoons and they kiss while their children react with disgust. Two birds kiss.
► A man looks at a woman and fireworks explode behind him; they move close together as if to kiss and they bump heads (they do not kiss). A male bird scoots close to a female bird and raises its wing to wrap around her but stops. Two birds play and sing romantic music for a male and a female bird. A man and a woman hug in a couple of scenes.
► A female bird invites a male bird to come along with her and the male bird makes a kissing sound thinking that she is asking him to have sex. A monkey sitting on a cell phone wiggles when it vibrates.
► A man removes his clothes and is shown wearing a gold lame tank top and jockey-style bottoms that reveal his legs and a part of his abdomen. Men and women are shown wearing costumes in several scenes that reveal cleavage, abdomens, backs and legs on the women and bare abdomens and legs on the men. A bird is shown missing numerous feathers and we see bare flesh and he holds a leaf over his front. Two men wear feather-covered costumes (one wears a tank top and jockey-style bottoms that reveal a bit of his bare abdomen). A man wearing a feather-covered tank top and jockey-style bottoms that reveal a bit of his bare abdomen dances to the chicken dance while riding on a float. A ball bounces off a woman's bikini clad buttock.
► A male and a female bird dance together and another bird says, "She likes you." A man talks about a male and a female bird being united to continue the species. A bird says, "I'm here to meet a girl." Two birds talk about how to help another bird attract a girl with "swagger" and how to "swing your tail and puff out your chest" and how to become a "love hawk." A bird talks about another bird and says, "Baby got beak" and calls her a "hot wing." A dog says, "I'm going to get my freak on" while dancing in a parade.
VIOLENCE/GORE 3 - A large bird holds a small bird in its talon and squeezes (we see the small bird's eyes bulge) and threatens to pop it; it then throws it and it hits a monkey that falls down. A bird fights with two other birds: it throws one bird against a wall and its wing is pinned under a cage, the attacker is thrown out of a plane and through the windshield and is caught in the propeller (we see a puff of feathers in the air) and the other two fall out of the plane and plummet toward the water below (they are eventually OK).
► A bird catches another bird in mid-flight, they fight and one takes the other away. Several birds fight with several monkeys and we see a lot of hitting and flipping and then see several monkeys on the floor unconscious. A bird bites a man on the hand, flies away and is caught by another bird that holds her throat in his talons and throws her back into a cage.
► A table saw blade spins and two birds move toward it: one is thrown into the air and the other is pulled into the air (the blade cuts off a bit of a feather), a dog wearing a metal mask falls into the blade and the blade cuts the mask in half (the dog and the birds are unharmed).
► Several birds are seen being snatched out of the air by nets and traps and locked in cages and crates in the back of a truck. A bird is placed in a burlap bag and he and another bird are taken away in a cage. Two birds are chained together and held in a cage in several scenes. We see a room filled with birds and one bat locked in cages. A bird throws another bird into a cage and locks the door.
► A baby bird walks toward the edge of its tree nest and falls out; the bird cannot fly and falls onto a pile of leaves (it's unharmed). A monkey is taken into the air by a bird and then dropped; the monkey screams and pleads with the bird and the bird stops him just before he crashes into the ground.
► A man holds food toward a bird that lunges at him and snatches the food violently (the man checks to make sure he still has his fingers). A bird drags a bone across the bars of cages where many other birds are held and the birds appear frightened. A bird reaches toward another bird's beak to remove a piece of food and the other bird snaps its beak closed nearly biting the bird.
► Two birds that are chained together fall out of a window, they hang over a clothesline and slide along, they bounce onto rooftops, they run through crowded alleys and sidewalks, and one of them barks at a cat that leaps into the air and lands on the face of a man that is chasing them. Several birds attack two other birds pecking them and pulling out their feathers.
► A bird chases two other birds and he crashes into a power box on a pole causing an explosion (we see the bird fall and later we see him charred but otherwise OK). Two birds that are chained together fall off a sheer cliff, they bounce off a ramp and land on a hang glider; they then fall off that and bounce off several other hang gliders, tearing one and causing another to fly through a crowded beach while throwing people and objects into the air.
► A man hits another man in the face. A man is shown with a bruised and scratched face and it is implied that a bird attacked him. A man smells a cloth that is apparently soaked with chloroform and he falls unconscious. A bird holds a cloth, presumably soaked with chloroform, over a man's face until he falls unconscious. A man puts a cage over another man's head. A boy bites a man's hand and he pulls away and yells. A boy is shown walking into a dark alley and climbing onto a roof where there is a makeshift shelter (he is homeless).
► Two birds "play dead." A male bird is placed in a prepared environment where a female bird approaches him and pins him to the floor with a claw wrapped around his throat, they talk and she attacks him again knocking him off a tree branch and onto the floor. A dog charges and pins two birds on the ground and we see strands of drool coming from its jowls (the dog lets the birds up unharmed). Two birds argue.
► A frog grabs a bug out of the air with its long tongue and the frog is eaten by a snake (we see the snake's large mouth wrapping around the frog as it sits motionless). A man throws a pencil that pins a fly and pierces a wall (we see the fly's severed wings).
► A large float speeds toward an airplane taxiing for take off, the plane lifts off and hits the top of the float but manages to fly away. A man and a woman fall off a motorcycle. A boy driving a motorcycle with two passengers speeds through narrow alleys and down several flights of stairs (no one is harmed). A man driving a truck slams on the brakes to stop at a red light and swerves in the snow-covered road causing a crate from the back of the truck to fall out and onto the ground.
► A bird pounds on a grate with a rock trying to escape. Two birds haul a large rock into the air and drop it, and the rope that holds the rock in the air pulls the birds through the air and they land hard on the ground. A bird tries to fly but gets caught in a string of holiday lights and dangles upside down. A man throws a bird, it can't fly and it crashes into the floor (it is unharmed). A bird begins chocking and another bird performs the Heimlich maneuver on him. A baby bird shivers from the cold and appears frightened when a girl picks it up. Two birds crack out of their eggs. A bird looks over a sheer drop off and is frightened because he cannot fly.
► A man slams into a plate glass window and slips down and onto the ground (he is unharmed). Two birds mock another bird and throw snowballs at the window of a shop where he is and they wag their tail feathers at him. A woman pounds on her alarm clock until it falls off the nightstand and onto the floor.
► A woman is startled when she is presented with a plate of chicken hearts and they are set ablaze (flambé). A bird is startled by people wearing Carnivale masks. A huge spider crawls on the back of a bird and another bird swats it away. A monkey picks the pockets of several people watching another monkey dance.
► A boy talks a bout not having any family. A man talks about birds having been rescued from smugglers and we see several wounded birds with bandages and other injuries. A bird says, "I'll have you rotisseried," "I'll poop on people" and "I'll make you ugly" during a song. A bird says, "We're doomed." A bird says, "I'm going to gnaw off my own leg." A bird says "I though you were dead." A dog says of birds "It makes you want to bite their heads off." A bird says, "I hate you." A bird says, "I hate Samba." A bird yells at two other birds and tells them "It's not a maraca. Stop shaking him" about an un-hatched egg they are shaking. A bird says, "They are scared to death of her" referring to his wife and children.
► A woman spits while brushing teeth (we do not see spittle). A bird belches and a woman remarks "Eww." A dog drools incessantly (we see drool hanging from its jowls) and says, "It's a medical condition." People slip and fall when they step on a dog's drool (no injuries are evident). A bird eats seeds from the inside of a man's open mouth. A bird eats a large worm. A bird appears to have mange and discolored patches of exposed skin. A woman's face is shown to be partially sunburned (half of her face is covered with a paper).
LANGUAGE 1 - 2 mild anatomical terms, 1 mild scatological term, name-calling (pet, idiot, bird nut, cannibal, evil, ghastly, putrid poultry, dumb, juicy mango, ugly, loser, brainiac, mean bird, funky monkey), exclamations (shut up, this is the spit, what the...), a woman says, "squawkity, squawk, squawk " and then says "I'm sorry I didn't mean to curse."
SUBSTANCE USE - We see glasses of wine on a restaurant table where a man and a woman sit.
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Rain Forest animals, Rio de Janeiro, trust, doing the right thing, extinction, Carnivale, exotic animal smuggling, natural instincts, love, affection, friendship, homelessness, poverty, appearance vs. brains, freedom, flying, having to rely on others, being lonely, being different.
MESSAGE - Wild animals belong in their native environments and with others of their kind.
(Note: There is an animated short prior to the feature entitled "Scrat's Continental Crack-Up" that includes the following violent sequences: A large rock formation cracks apart throwing a squirrel into a hole in the Earth, the squirrel falls toward the hot core, its paws glow red from the heat, the squirrel crashes onto a large rock sphere and chases its acorn around it, its tail wraps around the ball then unfurls and the squirrel is slung into the air; finally it falls back toward the ocean and crash lands on a small ice platform that cracks in half and separates the squirrel from his acorn and he screams.)
CAVEATS
Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.
We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.
Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.
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