What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that ages 14 and up could watch this on TV, where it airs fairly often. They give it quite a makeover to take out some of the racier content. Main characters Tess, Jack, and their contemporaries are in the midst of a drug-fueled, greedy era in which people will use anything they can, including their sexuality, to get what they want. Lots of women are naked in this film, from a woman in a porn video to the woman Mick cheats on Tess with. When they aren't naked, they're wearing revealing lingerie, from the full garter-belt get-up to a sexy slip. There are lots of cautionary tales in this film on how not to behave: At one point, Tess passes out from combining valium with tequila. When she wakes up in the morning in Jack's bed, she worries that she may have had sex with him. Today that would be considered rape. Everyone in this film lies to everyone else to get ahead, even when it's Tess stealing her idea back from Katharine.
- Families can talk about the ethics questions this film brings up. Is it ever OK to pretend to be someone you're not to get what you want? What about lying to people and stealing their ideas? How are humor and over-the-top characters used to lampoon this greedy era?