movies

One of the most anticipated kids movies of the year is too terrifying for children's eyes.

On Tuesday night I was lucky enough to snag myself four tickets to the advanced screening of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children.

I hadn’t read the book by Ransom Riggs, but I’d heard it was set to be an amazing adaptation. I’d always been a bit of a fan of Tim Burton‘s kookiness and the buzz around the office was that it was definitely a movie for the must watch list.

It’s safe to say I was busting to watch it.

I’d seen it being advertised on TV and was convinced it was a movie geared towards kids, so I suggested to my sister to bring my niece along.

It was all really last minute so I quickly Googled the rating which came back as PG-13*, and my niece is 7.

I told my sister she should maybe opt my niece out of this one and took my mum along instead.

Boy, would that decision save my sister a lot of sleep.

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 Boy, would that decision save my sister a lot of sleep. (Image: 20th Century Fox)

There we sat in the cinema, with our boxes of popcorn: myself, my two sister and my mum, all not too sure what to expect.

The intro began rolling and we were presented with an array of children with their own 'peculiarities' in the form of black, white and brown pictures.

One child that could float, one that was invisible, one that had bees living in their body, two twins with the face covered in white masks that we didn't know what they could do besides look terrifying.

The music was ominous and it all looked a bit creepy  before we were snapped back to reality. We were then introduced to Jacob Mortman, the main character and a seemingly normal boy, raised in a seemingly normal family with his seemingly normal parents.

I even let out a bit of a giggle at the fact that I felt a pang of fear as a grown adult. What was I so scared about? This is a kids' movie, how ridiculous, I thought.

Yet as the movie went on, I quickly reverted back to my initial assumption that the movie was not kid friendly.

Not at all. In fact, it was the stuff of childhood nightmares. I was always a scaredy cat as a kid and I was certain that if I'd seen Miss Peregrine's at the same age as my niece, I wouldn't sleep for months. Maybe years.

After being introduced to Jacob and his family, we met his grandfather Abraham Portman.

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Abraham was unwell with dementia when Jacob thought it best to visit his home and check in on him. He arrived to a dark and empty home that was framed to look at though it has been entered by force, with the back door torn to shreds.

Be very afraid. (Image: 20th Century Fox)

In search of his granddad, Jacob lurked into a nearby forest where he does find Abraham. Except he is pale, lifeless and missing his eyeballs.

No, I'm not kidding, his eyeballs were missing from their sockets. Just when I thought it couldn't get worse, I was introduced to the character that would be sure to have child-me in tears.

The Hollows.

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They have teeth like that of a piranha. Out of their mouths comes a series of long tongues. They do not have feet, instead they walk on stumps. They're huge, at least the size of four or five people stacked on top of each other. They are completely and utterly terrifying.

The main gist was that Hollows eat the eyeballs of peculiar children in an attempt to regain some of their human form.

They're essentially peculiars who went rogue during an experiment that backfired. And it only got worse from there. Some of these Hollows who managed to regain their human form lurked around with completely white eye balls.

About midway through the movie, I got this text from my sister:

My mum then leaned in and whispered, "I'm so glad we didn't bring Millie, I would've had to take her McDonalds and console her for hours."

After we left the cinema, my sister quickly texted some of her friends who were planning to take their kids to see Miss Peregrine's and warned them.

It's safe to say they all decided not to take their kids along after my sister briefed them about the contents of the movie. While my mum, sisters and I all really enjoyed the movie, it's undoubtedly not one for the kids.

If you don't want to deal with horrible nightmare in your household, just don't do it.

You've been warned.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children is in cinemas now. If you're an adult you should make sure you see it. 

* The PG-13 rating is according to IMDb, this may vary from country to country.