Parents need to know that this drama based on a 1925 novel isn't for most kids, despite its PG-13 rating. It's a serious, often painful contemplation of marriage under duress, featuring angry arguments as well as images of suffering cholera patients. Sexual intimacy includes one early, awkward scene in which a young bride invites her husband to her bed (he's embarrassed) and a couple of adulterous situations (a couple in bed, hiding from the jilted husband), as well as a couple of drunken scenes (in one, a white British man admires his much younger Chinese girlfriend; in another, a married couple has sex, with brief shots of naked bottoms and thighs). Characters drink, and couple of supporting players smoke cigarettes.

Families can talk about how Walter and Kitty end up appreciating each other's strengths and forgiving each other's failings. How do their circumstances -- surrounded by acute suffering -- encourage them to see past themselves and, as a result, see themselves more clearly? What are the movie's themes? Which characters are redeemed, and how? How does it stress the importance of communication (and show the consequences of a lack of communication)? What's lacking in Kitty and Walter's marriage? What makes a marriage good or bad?