A Night at the Kindergarten
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A Night at the Kindergarten
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this movie.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that A Night at the Kindergarten is a dark comedy about the depths parents will sink to in order to have power at the kindergarten their young children attend. Parents use mature language ("f--k," "s--t," "ass," "douchebag," "pr--k," "turd," "pee," "screw," "fart," "p--sy," "damn," and "hell") and have sex with each other during a meeting about ousting a misbehaving scholarship child. A parent brings a legal handgun to the meeting. A child later picks it up, but no one is hurt. It's reported that a 5-year-old kindergarten student stuffed sausage up a girl's nose, frequently used curse words, was mean to other children, drew a penis on the forehead of a child with Down syndrome, and fed meat to a vegetarian child. A child is locked in a box and injures herself trying to get out. Adults drink alcohol and smoke marijuana and cigarettes. In Polish with English subtitles.
What's the Story?
In A NIGHT AT THE KINDERGARTEN, Eryk (Piotr Witkowski) is dating Dorota (Masza Wgrocka), a nurse who works long hours. One night he volunteers to go to her son Tytus' kindergarten PTA meeting to get points with her. The meeting turns out to be a drunken, weed-sodden disaster in which one of the primary goals was to vote on whether to eject the misbehaving Tytus (Marcel Krzeminski) from the school permanently. Suddenly, the irresponsible Eryk becomes Tytus' advocate, pointing out how much more awful the parents at the meeting are than the little boy they're trying to expel. Class is part of the picture, too, as Tytus' mom, whose income is low, doesn't pay full tuition. Parents treat the meeting as a confessional about the trials of being a parent and admit embarrassing feelings under the influence of various mood-altering substances. A parent brings a handgun to the meeting, boasting he has a carry permit. The gun eventually becomes pivotal in a parental confrontation.
Is It Any Good?
A Night at the Kindergarten is especially adept at showing the way that supposedly responsible parents can behave just as childishly and cruelly as their "difficult " kids. However, this gets tedious in scenes in which parents seem to be letting their hair down and "admitting" how they really feel about their kids and how difficult it is to raise them. One woman says, "All kids are stupid and get less stupid" as they grow. She can't wait until hers grows enough so she has "someone to talk to." While Eryk seems to deepen from an irresponsible playboy to someone who begins to understand what Tytus is going through, there's still little in the way of character development or true dramatic interest here.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about how childishly the parents behave as they jockey for power in the school's leadership. How does that behavior compare with the bad behavior of the kids who attend the kindergarten?
Do we see growth in the immature boyfriend who attends the meeting on behalf of his girlfriend's child? How does he change?
What is the movie's attitude toward parents who try to help run their children's schools?
Movie Details
- On DVD or streaming: December 28, 2022
- Cast: Piotr Witkowski, Masza Wgrocka
- Director: Rafael Skalski
- Studio: Netflix
- Genre: Comedy
- Run time: 96 minutes
- MPAA rating: NR
- Last updated: January 9, 2023
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