Parents' Guide to

Mirage

By Barbara Shulgasser-Parker, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 16+

Time-travel thriller has bloody violence and cursing.

Movie NR 2019 129 minutes
Mirage Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

See all
age 12+

Based on 1 parent review

BgsMma
BgsMma Adult
March 27, 2019
age 12+

Excellent film

Very brief, implied, clothed sex between controversial characters. When it's discovered another man's unfaithful, his mistress is seen sleeping in bed (covered) and is later seen walking across the floor in her underwear. Flashes of genuine marital love, with brief exposure of the woman's breast. Eyes can be averted for this, and conversations centered on the quality of a man's character, as well as the consequences of our actions can be had with older kids. I said age 12 because my own 12 year old is mature enough for the content, but others may choose to wait until 14.
See all 1 parent review

What's the Story?

MIRAGE combines a murder thriller with a time-travel, alternate-universe story in which Vera (Adriana Ugarte), a happily married woman, moves into a new house with her husband, David (Alvaro Morte), and young daughter, Gloria (Luna Fulgencio). A nurse now, Vera left medical school to raise her daughter. On a stormy night paralleling a similar stormy night 25 years ago, Vera connects to a monitor and video camera left by her new home's previous owners. This puts her in touch with a 1989 12-year-old boy (Joel Illescas) -- someone who knew her husband -- and leads to information about a murder across the street that indirectly caused the boy's death. She catches the boy just before that fateful moment, warning him to avoid the truck that will hit him. In this universe, he lives to accuse his neighbor of murder. But when trapped in that reality herself, Vera learns she is a neurosurgeon who neither married nor had a child. Desperate to persuade people in this new reality to help her return to her own reality, she meets a skeptical cop (Chino Darin) and others concerned about her sanity. She's also now bent on helping police solve the murder as she searches for a route back to the life she preferred, which requires she "re-create conditions" of that time, a daunting concept for even the pluckiest of heroines.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (1):
Kids say (2):

Like many movies about time travel and supposed wrinkles in the time-space continuum, this one doesn't always conform to its own invented internal logic at times, but somehow it remains interesting. Where exactly has Vera been deposited? Into the past? Into the future? A parallel universe? Compelling performances by Adriana Ugarte and Chino Darin keep the bumpy plot going, and mature teens may find the confusion to be part of the fun.

At one point, a character makes a timeline to understand what's going on, but even that attempt at clarification doesn't explain why characters' ages seem to be off. Adults 25 years later look the exact same age, while a boy from 1989 has somehow matured to adulthood. Vera speaks of seeking a gate to the "past," but in her new reality she doesn't seem any older than she did in her other reality. Mirage's spoken message is that "nothing proves anything," perhaps not a conclusion some parents would find appropriate in an era in which faith in institutions is being undermined worldwide.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about the possibility of time travel. Do you think it's possible now, as Mirage suggests? Do you think it might be possible some day?

  • If you could travel in time, where would you go, and why?

  • At one point a character talks to his younger self. What would you tell your younger self if you had a chance to have that conversation?

Movie Details

Inclusion information powered by

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

See all recommended movie lists

Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.

See how we rate