The Motion Picture Association Needs Another Rating

Last Saturday night, Hubby and I had date night. It was probably one of our last long ones for a while with the second rugrat on the way. He indulged me by taking me out for my favorite tacos and letting me see a movie I wanted to see. Huge mistake. Not the tacos (or the deep-fried Snickers we had for dessert). No, no... the movie. That was a mistake.

When I was pregnant with The Ambassador, Eight Below was playing in theaters. Picture us: two young (shush) parents-to-be, not a care in the world, and no responsibilities to speak of, other than a massive mortgage and four dogs who needed to go outside sometime in the next six hours or they would exact their revenge upon our beautiful rugs. Those two naive people went to see a sweet Disney movie about a pack of snow dogs lost in a storm.

What we failed to remember is that every single Disney movie ever made ends badly. Oh, sure, they try to create a happy ending, but the underlying tragedies (Bambi's mother, anyone?) never really escape your psyche. It's amazing that everyone who grew up watching the old-school Disney movies didn't become serial jaywalkers.

So, anyway, there we were two years ago, riveted to the appalling acting of Paul Walker, and watching dogs identical to the ones we love fight for their furry little lives. Oh, did you not know that? Were you not aware that our four dogs were all Huskies and Malamutes or some combination thereof? Here, let me help you imagine the scene in the theater:


Hormonal woman in her final trimester of her first pregnancy, leans on her husband, enjoying their final childless date night, despite the fact that the person behind them is chewing too loudly and the pregnant woman can smell the popcorn already leaching out of her husband's pores. She hates popcorn and loud chewers and makes it a rule to avoid movies for those reasons, but has acquiesced to this date night, because she knows she will likely never go out again and because it's a charming movie about snow dogs. She loves her own "fur children", and while she does grasp that her relationship with them will never be the same again after the birth of her child, she underestimates the vitriol she will someday feel for them and has no idea that in a matter of two years, she will routinely refer to them as "the furry assholes". Perhaps if she was aware of that, she wouldn't have been so upset by what was to follow.

SCENE 1: Dogs and moviegoers are happy. The dogs look like this (except there are more of them, of course. This rehashing is on a budget, and I don't want to go downstairs and get our actual dogs, because they'll just act like assholes while I try to photograph them):



SCENE 2: Dogs and moviegoers grow concerned as dogs are left behind in Antartica during big snow storm. Pregnant woman gets a little weepy, picturing her beloved "children" in similar peril.

SCENE 3: Old Jack (who is identical to our Yukon) is the first dog buried in the storm, when he cannot escape his chains. Moviegoers are concerned, but hopeful, forgetting that this movie was written by those heartless fucks at Disney.

SCENE 4: The first dog dies. It is clearly dead, there is no turning back, and the pregnant woman begins sobbing quietly in the dark, because the dead dog bears a shocking resemblance to Alpha Bitch. (Hard to believe? People, I really did love all of them back them. Really.)



SCENES 5,6, & 7: Narrow escapes. Harrowing adventures. Dogs might die, but don't. Pregnant woman breathes raggedly, but her tears have ceased to fall in any meaningful quantity.

SCENE 8: Another one bites the dust. The sobbing begins anew. The pregnant woman's breath hitches and catches as if she is a toddler in the midst of a tantrum. This dog doesn't even look like one of her dogs, but it doesn't matter, because she can clearly picture Ginormous in the scene:



SCENE 9: But wait! We make our final return to the area where the dogs were chained up, with hope still alive in our hearts, hope that Old Jack is still alive.



SCENE 10: But of course, Old Jack is as dead as the proverbial doornail, and this sends the pregnant woman into uncontrollable spasms of grief, preventing her and her husband from leaving the theater before the credits are over, lest the other moviegoers glimpse her red-rimmed eyes and her soggy tissues still wadded and clutched in her damp, snot-smeared hand and call 9-1-1, convinced the woman is heading into labor.





Yeah, so that was Eight Below, my movie choice during my first pregnancy. My choice for the second pregnancy and last weekend's date night? Changeling. In summary: It was not an uplifting flick, even Hubby cried, and Clint Eastwood is a bigger bastard than Disney. There should be special movie ratings for pregnant women. That's all I'm saying.