Parents' Guide to

The Chaperone

By Sandie Angulo Chen, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 12+

Wrestler's family comedy is forgettable but OK for tweens.

Movie PG-13 2011 103 minutes
The Chaperone Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

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

Community Reviews

age 10+

Based on 3 parent reviews

age 11+

Tween Movie with some Violence

This is a Disney Channel -like- movie + guns. (I think the only reason for the PG-13 rating). Older teens will definitely be bored by this movie if they are no longer interested in the Disney Channel. Mild violence but I don't think appropriate for younger kids. I feel the movie was trying to have a moral message but I didn't like for my younger kids to see children in the movie help to break the law, lie to the police, etc. As a parent I found it boring, but overall the main character did have a change of heart about himself and wanted to help others, which was good. My children were entertained by the movie.

This title has:

Too much violence
age 11+

Kinda funny, kinda boring.

My 11-year-old and I watched this, it was kind of a bore but it had it's funny moments. I'd say eleven and up due to the profanity (though it's lighter then the average PG-13 movie I see).

This title has:

Too much swearing

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (3):
Kids say (9):

For a wrestler-turned-actor vehicle, The Chaperone isn't all bad. There are plenty of supporting players who do a decent job with their roles, especially Winter as the confused and hurt Sally and Yeardley Smith (the voice of Lisa Simpson) as the frazzled junior-high sponsor in charge of the trip. Corrigan can always be counted on to be a funny gangster type, and it's good to see that '80s favorite Gish can still pop up as the occasional mom in a movie, even if she has very little to do here.

Even Levesque himself isn't horrible; he's just trying to fit one of the two acceptable roles for WWE wrestlers -- guys out for revenge (The Marine) or scary dudes who are secretly great at childcare (think Dwayne Johnson). The problem is that the movie's script is a tired amalgamation of one too many family film cliches. There's the kids-save-the-day formula, plus the reformed ex-con times the deadbeat dad trying to redeem himself. And, of course, the Home Alone bits of physical comedy meshed with violence -- like criminals who crash into dirty diaper trucks or who are generally outsmarted by young, techno-savvy kids. Were this an ABC Family TV movie, it would be easy to forgive the trite storyline, but given that families have to pay to see this, it could and should be so much better.

Movie Details

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