Two serious movies I recently watched with my 12-year-old son

A couple of weeks ago, we went to see Deadpool & Wolverine, which was anything but serious. But it was fine — I didn’t mind the silliness, grotesque violence, or profanities. I think it’s better to expose kids to this kind of comic violence rather than overprotect them.

We don’t stream movies that often, but somehow, this week, we spent two evenings watching very serious ones.

The first was picked by my son. He’ll be thirteen at the end of this year. I was surprised he wanted to watch it, but I understand why — he remembered it’s one of his older brother’s favorite movies (his brother is now seventeen). I’ve also noticed that he enjoys history — several times, he has surprised me with his knowledge, whether it’s about American history or World War II. The movie was Roman Polanski’s The Pianist.

It had been a while since I last watched the movie, and I greatly enjoyed rewatching it. My son enjoyed it too. It was a welcome change from the myriad of superhero and fantasy movies we’d seen over the past few years. In the end, it’s just a movie, so I don’t want to sound too “deep” in interpreting it, but I do think there’s value in my son witnessing the deep darkness of the incredible suffering and horrors that humanity endured less than a century ago. Without getting political, I also feel it’s especially important these days to remain aware of the enduring darkness of antisemitism.