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A Wrinkle in Time | 2018 | PG | - 1.4.1

A 13-year-old girl (Storm Reid) acts out, frustrated and sad because her astrophysicist father (Chris Pine) disappeared four years earlier during a time travel experiment. Bullied by classmates and derided by teachers, she turns to her younger brother (Deric McCabe) who introduces her to his three celestial friends (Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kaling) and she reluctantly agrees to an inter-dimensional journey to find her father. Also with Levi Miller, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Zach Galifianakis and Michael Peña. Directed by Ava DuVernay. [1:49]

SEX/NUDITY 1 - A woman and her husband kiss for a few seconds. A teen boy and a teen girl stand very close together twice and hug briefly.
 A first grader hears a teacher remark that his father "Disappeared to be with another woman" and the child shouts, "Shame on you!"
 A woman wears a loose tube top that reveals cleavage. A teen girl wears a tight sweater with a cut-out over each shoulder, and a very short skirt over dark tights. In a crowded beach scene one man is shirtless and seen in profile. A woman wears a halter top seen in profile (we see her bare shoulder and part of her bare back) and another woman wears a bikini top (we see her side and back).

VIOLENCE/GORE 4 - A young boy is hypnotized and goes to a bubble chamber with a man, followed by a teen girl and a teen boy: the man stands attached to marionette cables and falls to pieces as his joints separate (he looks like plastic), the boy is possessed by an evil entity called "It" and shouts at the teen boy and teen girl, the girl walks up invisible stairs that become outlined in ink, and walks to the bubble chamber and falls to the floor unharmed as the young boy shouts and points off-screen as the others slide down an unseen drain into a black tunnel (we see the now unconscious teens); the teen girl wakes up, coughs black smoke, shouts as the walls go wavy, the scene cuts to the girl in a dark cave, the young boy is shown with a cracked face through which light glows and he throws energy with his hands to capture the girl in large fiery tendril-like fingers three times, throwing her down and across the cave until she meets her evil twin, who knocks her down; she keeps getting back up and shouting, telling the boy that she loves him until his face is normal and his energy-throwing powers are gone and the teen girl passes out but awakens as he comes to her and glitter flows from her closed eyes.
 A teen boy falls out of the sky, a girl screams, and we see thousands of giggling flowers run on their stems and then shoot into the sky to cushion the boy's fall (he is unharmed).
 A group of children and spirit guides travel inter-dimensionally several times and the scenes seem to fold and change into a curtain (like an aurora borealis) as the characters walk through and toward other worlds: The characters walk along stone paths in a black and white rock world and they find a cave with glowing logs and rocks making paths that rock and sway and a teen girl nearly falls several times. Another world shows a wheat field that explodes loudly with instantly-growing trees that make a forest as they rip out of the earth; the trees sway as a large black cloud of dust and dirt growls and chases the children through the trees until the cloud becomes a twister full of lightning as off-screen voices tell the kids to run for a rock wall and a teen boy and a teen girl hide inside a hollow tree stump and it is pulled into the air and falls over the rock wall to safety.
 A teen girl initiates inter-dimensional travel with her mind, causing a room's walls to become like the aurora borealis; three spirit guides and a small boy walk through the aurora and the teen girl steps through and floats among streams of glitter. As three children float and fly above a woman that has turned into an elongated flying cabbage, we see a large dark, tangled cloud pulsating in the middle distance and sending out black spiky tendrils as it growls. We see in a crystal ball, as a dark cloud sends out tendrils to surround and then stab the Earth. A young boy at a beach has a sandwich that turns to sand as he looks into the red irises of a man in a multi-colored suit. Balls of leaves, each on top of multiple tree trunks in a background shot, begin walking like animals. A man is seen gathered up in a stream of light and glitter. A teen girl hurts all over every time she completes time travel through wavy scenes and wormholes where the outline of her face appears in a rubber-like wall briefly; in one such scene, a spirit guide kicks her in the leg to make sure she is alive and the girl shouts, "Ow!"
 Three spirit guides fade as they stand in a field, telling two teens and a young boy to go into an evil world to search for their father themselves, by having faith in themselves; the guides flow away into the air as misty streams that disappear.
 Two men harass an elderly man sitting on a bench at night with two bags of possessions; the attackers laugh and scatter the man's things into the street. A teen girl argues with her father, her little brother, a school principal, and mean girls at school. A teen girl throws a soccer ball into the face of a mean girl, knocking her down. A teen girl receives a note and a comment that she should disappear like her father did. A room full of scientists laughs at a man's presentation and he later tells his wife that they should beat up the scientists. A father yells at his son maniacally about earning grades of 82%, which is less than an "A." A frustrated man kicks his computer table. In a cul-de-sac, kids stand in driveways bouncing balls as several 1950s housewives come out and call the children to dinner; one woman invites three additional children to eat and looks angry when they decline.
 We hear that the universe is under attack from pure evil called "It." We hear that the world is full of violence, jealousy, and envy. A supernatural woman appears amid a loud rain storm and tells a teen girl, a young boy and their mother that there is such a thing as a tesseract and time travel. A teen girl and a young boy enter an abandoned house and find a supernatural woman who talks about love. A giant supernatural woman appears in a yard and tells a teen girl and a young boy about inter-dimensional space and how they can find their lost father there (the supernatural being later shrinks to human size).

LANGUAGE 1 - 1 anatomical term, name-calling (crazy, stupid, idiot, insanely nice, weirdo, pathetic, problematic, delinquent, mean, aberration), 3 exclamations (watch your tongue, oh man, I swear, shut-up).

SUBSTANCE USE - None

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Absent fathers, broken families, parenting, angels/spirit guides, science, the need for young African-American girls to study STEM subjects, secular humanism, diversity, bullies, envy, gossip, love, respect, self-esteem, determination, success.

MESSAGE - The universe creates each person as a special someone who can save the world.

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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