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Maverick

(1994, Rated PG, Comedy, Starring Jodie Foster, Mel Gibson, James Garner)

  • Is it age appropriate?

    About our ratings

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    Not age appropriate for kids under 9, age appropriate for kids over 12; suggested age 12.

  • Is it any good?

    3.0

  • Common Sense says

    '90s Western offers a few laughs and so-so adventure.

Themes in this movie include:   family relationships, friendship, honesty, materialism, revenge

Why We Rated This on for Ages 12 and Up

The good stuff

  • Messages:

    Most bad behavior is punished. The movie makes fun of the usual caricatures and heavy-handed treatment of Native Americans in other Westerns. Cleverness and smarts are shown to defeat brute strength, greed, and destructive behavior. Some con artists are treated as jovial and benign, conning only those who are looking for an edge and not always honest themselves.

  • Role models:

    The leading female character is portrayed as independent, capable, and smart, though often dishonest.  The heroes are con artists, bluffers, and rogues, though good men, honest, and loyal at heart.
 

What to watch out for

  • Violence:

    Mostly light-hearted jeopardy and action including extended sequence on runaway stagecoach; barroom brawls; man prepped for hanging with snakes hissing at his feet; explosion during a bank robbery; fight on the edge of a cliff; casino shoot-out. Some deaths occur during gunplay, but there's no blood and none of the scenes focus on bodies or injuries.

  • Sex:

    A few passionate kisses culminating in a scene played for humor in which there's suggested off-camera sexual activity; we see a bare male chest along with bare female shoulders. Some sexual innuendo, including one reference to penis size that should go over the heads of most kids.

  • Language:

    Infrequent, mild profanity, including "piss," "s--t," "bastards," "whorehouse," "asshole,""son of a bitch,""damn," "jackass," "hell."

  • Consumerism:

    Not an issue.

  • Drinking, drugs, & smoking:

    Occasional background drinking in bar. Suggested drunkenness in one scene. Some cigar smoking.
 

What Parents Need to Know

About Maverick

Parents need to know that this movie's sole purpose is to be entertaining. It's filled with old-time Western action, but it's played for fun here. There are lots of fistfights, shootings, steely-eyed bad guys, coiled hissing snakes, and even a literal "cliffhanger" (one character hangs over a steep gorge for what seems like forever). Occasionally someone dies, but the object here is to keep real violence to a minimum and overstate the battles for humorous effect. There are sexual innuendos, some passionate kissing, a bare chest (male) and a bare shoulder (female), and some cigar smoking. The Native Americans wear war paint, howl, and shake their fists at the sky, but it's delivered to parody the stereotypes that show up in other Westerns.

Did this review help you decide?

Families Can Talk About

  • Families can talk about how this movie is a different type of Western. What are some of the things that show us that this isn't an actual portrayal of the Old West, but a humorous and fond look backwards?
  • What does the movie say about appearance versus reality? Which people pretend to be one thing but are really something else? Which people have surprising secrets?
  • What do you think the filmmakers are hoping you'll understand about movie stereotyping?
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