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▲Poster of the movie "Alien: Taken".

"Alien is so scary!" The Hollywood sci-fi thriller "Alien: Revenge" is currently in theaters, and the topic of an 8-year-old child being scared by the movie has also become a hot search.

According to reports, a certain cinema received a complaint recently. A viewer said that his 8-year-old child was scared while watching "Alien: Reaper". He questioned the cinema for showing a movie that was not suitable for children and demanded compensation. This also triggered a discussion on whether parents should take their children to the cinema to watch horror movies.

The long-standing Hollywood film series "Alien" created an immortal alien monster - the Alien. An adult Alien is two or three meters tall, has an exoskeleton as hard as iron, highly corrosive sulfuric acid blood, and the ability to quickly heal itself after being injured, and can even survive in space.

In North America, the series has always been classified as R-rated, which means restricted, "people under 17 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian to watch". This time, the domestic cinemas introduced "Alien: Rescue Ship" and released it simultaneously with North America, so it was "uncut". This has even become a marketing selling point for domestic cinemas.

For this reason, the film's producer repeatedly reminded "underage audiences to choose movies with caution" on its official Weibo account, and the official poster also had the same reminder. However, the facts show that some parents still did not pay attention to this reminder and took their underage children to the cinema to watch the movie. The children only raised questions after being "scared".

To protect minors and choose films suitable for children to watch, producers, theaters, and parents need to perform their respective duties. For films that minors cannot watch, theaters should prohibit minors from entering; for films that minors must be accompanied by parents or guardians, theaters should check whether there are guardians accompanying them and remind guardians to choose carefully and fulfill their guardianship responsibilities.

It is worth noting that although the film producer stated on the poster that "underage audiences should watch with caution", this lacks clarity and operability compared to the requirement of R-rated films that "children under 17 must be accompanied by parents or guardians to watch". The latter does not allow children under 17 to watch without their parents or guardians, while the former allows minors to make careful choices without their parents or guardians. Underage audiences, especially those under 14, may not be able to make careful choices.

The parents who complained this time may not have seen the relevant reminders, or they may not have paid attention, and mistakenly thought that as long as the movie was publicly shown in the cinema, anyone could watch it, so they took their children there. After all, it was rare for children to be "scared" by movies before. This is actually another reminder to all parties involved.

On the one hand, it is necessary for film producers and cinemas to further clarify the "underage audiences should watch with caution". Not only should this be indicated on promotional posters, but it is also necessary to provide further reminders during film screenings to effectively prevent minors from being exposed to violent, pornographic and other film and television content.

At the same time, we can also learn from the treatment of the film when it was screened abroad, and clearly require that minors must be accompanied by their parents or guardians to buy tickets and enter the cinema to watch. If minors buy movie tickets or enter the cinema on their own, they should be dissuaded and prohibited in a timely manner.

On the other hand, parents and guardians should take reminders about minors’ movie-watching seriously, and should even take the initiative to learn about relevant information about the movies.

First, parents should do their homework and make careful choices based on the reminders of the producers and cinemas and their children's situations, so that their children can be mentally prepared for watching the movies. Secondly, parents should pay attention to supervision and guidance when their children are watching movies, explain the plots of the movies to children with insufficient cognitive abilities, and avoid negative impacts on their children caused by watching the movies.

In other words, for films that "underage audiences should watch with caution", producers and cinemas should fulfill their obligations to inform, remind and supervise, and parents must also fulfill their guardianship and guidance responsibilities, so that they can work together to prevent children from being "scared" by movies and implement the protection of minors.

Written by Xiong Bingqi (education scholar)

Editor/ He Rui

Proofreading/ Yang Li