Rent (PG-13)
New York artists face eviction and more.
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- Studio: Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Columbia Pictures Entertainment
- Directed By: Chris Columbus
- Cast: Rosario Dawson, Anthony Rapp, Jesse L. Martin
- Running Time: 135 minutes
- Release Date: 11/23/2005
- Video/DVD Release Date: 02/21/2006
- Genre: Musical
- MPAA Rating: PG-13
- MPAA Explanation: mature thematic material involving drugs and sexuality, and for some strong language.
Parents need to know
Families can talk about drugs, alcohol, AIDs, ambition and the alternative family formed by these diverse friends. How does Tom and Angel's relationship serve as the primary model for unconditional love and loyalty? How do the reconciliations of quarreling couples (Joanne and Maureen, Mimi and Roger) show that trust can overcome insecurities and jealousies? How does the film show a class conflict between landlords and renters or squatters?
Message
Social Behavior:
Characters do drugs; characters argue and fight; in the end, they learn the value of love.
Consumerism:
New York City streets include billboards, flyers, and neon ads for fictional brands.
Drugs/Alcohol/Tobacco:
Smoking, drinking, and pot-smoking; heroin purchase and shooting.
Violence
Character beaten by street thugs in beginning; a couple of HIV+ characters become visibly ill; one dies.
Sex
Characters sing about love and sex; one dances at a strip club; another is a drag queen' couples are gay, lesbian, and straight.
Language
Lyrics include at least two f-words, as well as other mild and frequent cursing.
Common Sense says
What's the story?
Reviewed by Cynthia Fuchs
Based on the hit Broadway musical (which, in turn, was based on Puccini's La Boheme), RENT focuses on eight artist friends who struggle to pay their rent and contend with disease, addiction, and violence and love in a gritty New York City neighborhood. From aspiring filmmaker Mark (Anthony Rapp) to heroin addict/exotic dancer Mimi (Rosario Dawson), each character has their own challenges to deal with and demons to face.
Is it any good?
An energetic rock musical, Rent features one big number after another. Chris Columbus' movie version of Jonathan Larson's Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning big doozy rock musical took nearly 10 years to reach the screen. It focuses on the resilience of a new generation of oppressed "types," assorted victims of prejudice, poverty, addiction, and disease. Featuring six of the original eight stage cast members, Rent is beset by awkward transitions between numbers (song ends, fade out, next song), and exposition conveyed by lyrics. The performers sing their stories and desires, framed by cheesy hooks, sing-talking them when the language just becomes too cumbersome for crooning. (This device, too familiar from Andrew Lloyd Webber works, is either wearying or rousing, depending on your tolerance level.)
Still, Rent does offer up real ideas about class hierarchy. Everyone here is concerned with property -- intellectual, amorous, and geographic -- and no one seems able to work for money, save for Mimi (Rosario Dawson), who spends it on heroin. Mark (Anthony Rapp) eventually takes a job with the "sleazy" tv tab show Buzzline, where he learns (as expressed in the song "What You Own"), "When you're living in America / At the end of the millennium, / You're what you own."
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