``Unaccompanied Minors'' (PG, 1 hr., 29 min.)

``Unaccompanied Minors'' is a charmless, ethically shaky farce about tweens and younger kids traveling alone on Christmas Eve and running amok while stranded at an airport during a blizzard. Children 10 and older might find amusement here, as the young cast engages in potentially infectious silliness. Under-10s might like it, too, but a car explosion and chase scenes could unnerve littler ones. Most adults come off as either mean or idiotic and one older character is shown drunk on creme de menthe. The PG covers mildly crude humor, while in a more serious vein, the kids discuss the difficulties of having divorced parents.

The hijinks begin with a food fight among the stranded child travelers, who quickly overcome the guy (Wilmer Valderrama) assigned to keep them together. A few sneak out for spending sprees in the terminal, which is stealing, since they run up tabs knowing they can't pay. Rounded up by security guards, they get out again and a leader emerges -- Spencer (Dyllan Christopher), who is determined to get to a nearby hotel where his little sister (Dominique Saldana) has been sent with the ``good kids.'' Ignoring threats from a fuming airport official (Lewis Black), Spencer et al. (Tyler James Williams, Brett Kelly, Gina Mantegna and Quinn Shephard) evade the guards and hit the baggage room first, taking stuff for fun.
  

``Blood Diamond'' (R, 2 hrs., 30 min.)

``Blood Diamond'' poses an ethical question: Do you know where your diamonds came from? It is a terrific, harrowing thriller, but also shockingly violent, frighteningly realistic and, alas, far too bloody to recommend for high-schoolers under 17. It depicts great suffering and chaos in Africa, vicious point-blank shootings of men, women and children and the heavy implication that limbs are hacked off. There is also strong profanity, chain-smoking and drinking. Director Edward Zwick hurls a terrific cast into the mayhem, speaking angry dialogue that is rarely pedantic, to explain how diamond mining in certain parts of Africa underwrites repressive governments, white mercenaries and brutal guerrilla fighters who slaughter and rape, and conscript little boys to be killers. ``Blood Diamond'' is often tough to watch, but impossible to ignore.

``Apocalypto'' (R, 2 hrs., 18 min.)

``The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause'' G (Bright colors and slapstick may divert kids from tacky sets, poorly molded elf ears and charmless, pseudo-sentimental script in lame, derivative sequel (to ``The Santa Clause,'' PG, 1994, which wasn't bad, and ``The Santa Clause 2,'' G, 2002, which was); Scott (Tim Allen), the regular guy who took up the Santa mantle in 1994, is in his busy pre-Christmas season; his wife (Elizabeth Mitchell) is very pregnant, so he brings her parents (Alan Arkin and Ann-Margret) up to visit, hiding from them the fact that he is Santa and they are at the North Pole; nasty Jack Frost (Martin Short -- droll, but unable to save the film) plots to make their visit a disaster. Under-6s may be scared when Jack Frost freezes people, or Mrs. Santa goes (gently) into labor; one flatulent reindeer.)
   
-- 7 AND OLDER:

``Happy Feet'' PG (Computer-animated fable spends its first two acts as a glorious, funny, touching penguin pop musical celebrating diversity; act three morphs into a grim screed about human encroachment on the birds' Antarctic habitat; despite a happy ending, it feels like two films; Mumble (voice of Elijah Wood), a fledgling Emperor penguin, doesn't have the singing voice, or ``heartsong,'' crucial to finding a mate; instead, he's driven to tap dance (his steps reflect ``motion-captured'' moves of tap genius Savion Glover) and his colony rejects him; he finds comical friends among an Adelie colony (led by Robin Williams as Ramon) of Latino penguins; sad about losing the love of silver-throated Gloria (Brittany Murphy) at his home colony, he goes off to learn why the penguin fish supply is shrinking and he encounters humans. Scary bits include looming ships, huge fishing nets and debris; extra-scary scenes show leopard seals, killer whales, birds of prey bursting out of water or swooping down at Mumble; a penguin nearly asphyxiates as a plastic six-pack holder tightens on his neck. Intense for many kids under 7, some under 8.)
    
-- 10 AND OLDER:

``Unaccompanied Minors'' PG (NEW) (Charmless, ethically dubious farce about tweens traveling alone, stranded in an airport during a Christmas Eve blizzard and raising cain, running up bills they can't pay for and stealing stuff from the baggage room; one boy (Dyllan Christopher) aims to get to a nearby hotel where his little sister (Dominique Saldana) has been sent with the ``good'' kids; he leads the escapee kids in defiance of a furious airport official (Lewis Black). A car explosion and realistic chase scenes might unnerve under-10s who would like the silliness otherwise; adults come off as mean and/or idiotic; one grown-up is shown drunk; semi-crude humor; kids discuss pain of having divorced parents.)

``The Nativity Story'' PG (Reverent, understated dramatization (based on gospels of Matthew and Luke) of the story of Mary, Joseph and the birth of Jesus; fine actors, authentic-looking settings, and a fervent but non-proselytizing tone that will move believers, but not put off non-Christians. In Massacre of the Innocents, a soldier draws his sword and a parent weeps over a dead child -- nothing graphic shown; pained talk among Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes), her family and intended husband Joseph (Oscar Isaac) about her pregnancy -- they doubt at first her claims of virginity and divine intervention; crowd threatens to stone her; dead prisoners shown bound to trees or crucified; a snake startles Mary's donkey; depiction of labor pains. Kids need good concentration for this.)

``Deck the Halls'' PG (Danny DeVito and Matthew Broderick waste time and electricity as New England neighbors who feud over one guy's (DeVito) glitzy Christmas lights in a crass, throwaway comedy. Mild, but occasionally naughty sexual innuendo: not-quite-naked cheesecake poster, a boy spying on pretty teenage twins, a verbal joke hinting that a man's privates are slipping out of his briefs, homophobic humor, references to sheriff being a cross-dresser (bra and thong visible at edges of uniform), teen girls do a mildly sexy dance at a holiday fest and their fathers, not recognizing them, cheer as though they were strippers; gross gags; rare mild profanity; irreverent use of holy water; speed skating pileup.)

-- PG-13s:
    
``The Holiday'' (NEW) (Utterly phony but quite watchable (pretty people, pretty decor) romantic comedy may delight sentimental high-schoolers; a shy London magazine writer (Kate Winslet) and a self-absorbed Los Angeles maker of film trailers (Cameron Diaz, mugging rather than acting), eager to escape wretched love lives, arrange via a Web site to swap houses over Christmas; the English girl meets a nice composer (Jack Black) in L.A.; the L.A. girl meets the English girl's dishy brother (Jude Law). One couple starts an affair just minutes after meeting; no sexual situations apart from semi-passionate kisses and bedroom cuddles; sex discussed, but in muted, nonexplicit language; brief, allusion to suicide; rare profanity; sexual innuendo; drinking. Not for middle-schoolers.)

``Deja Vu'' (Denzel Washington rules the screen as an ATF agent investigating the bombing of a crowded New Orleans ferry in nifty if preposterous thriller that mixes suspense, humanism, faith and physics; via a new, time-bending surveillance technology, he observes the last days of one apparent victim (Paula Patton). Ferry explosion is harrowing, people hurled overboard, some on fire -- no deaths, injuries graphically shown; point-blank shootings; car chases, crashes; emergency-room defibrillation; drowning; sexual innuendo, some of it semi-crude (joke hinting at gay sex in prison); implied nudity; rare profanity; drug reference. Violence, domestic terror themes too intense for some middle-schoolers.)

``Apocalypto'' (NEW) (Wholly involving, visually ravishing, ultraviolent thriller set during last days of Mayan empire in Central America, nearly 500 years ago; using all indigenous actors, shot mostly from viewpoint of hunter/family (Rudy Youngblood) who struggles with mythic intensity to escape captivity with brutal troops from a Mayan city who overrun his village, so he can rescue his hidden wife and young son. Graphically, gaspingly violent (a Gibson trademark); children being hurt; a hard childbirth; attempted rapes; partial nudity; sexual innuendo; rare profanity. In Mayan dialect with subtitles. 17 and older.)

``The History Boys'' (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) (Wonderfully performed, mostly unstagy adaptation of Alan Bennett's smart, funny, ironic, bittersweet hit play with original London cast; bright boys from blue collar families in 1980s England prep for entrance exams to Oxford and Cambridge, weighing philosophies of a flawed but wonderful old teacher (Richard Griffiths) who believes in knowledge for its own sake and a new history instructor (Stephen Campbell Moore) who teaches them to ace tests with slick answers. Very strong profanity; explicit sexual language; discussion of a teacher's inappropriate touching of older boys; one scene subtly implies it; discussion among boys of sexual matters. More for college kids.)

``National Lampoon's Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj'' (NEW) (Lewd, gross frat-house humor makes for occasionally funny, mostly obnoxious sequel to ``National Lampoon's Van Wilder'' (R, 2002); Kal Penn stars as Taj, a former Wilder acolyte, now a grad student in England, using what he learned about partying and getting sex; frozen out of a snooty white fraternity, he becomes adviser to a houseful of outcasts and declares war on the campus snob (Daniel Percival). Highly graphic sexual language and slang; toplessness; implied sexual situations; sexual humor about animals; strong profanity; pot-smoking; drinking; toilet humor. No one under 17.)

``Turistas'' (Savvy thriller exploits American paranoia in tale of young Western tourists (chiefly Josh Duhamel, Melissa George, Olivia Wilde, Desmond Askew) stranded in jungles of Brazil after a bus mishap, partying on the beach, then waking up to find they've been drugged and set up by a village doctor (Miguel Lunardi) who wants their kidneys; slyly contrived as a Third World/First World issue. Graphic surgery; gunplay, stabbings, head-bashings; strong profanity; toplessness; sexual innuendo; nonexplicit sexual situations; drug use, drinking, smoking. 16 and up.)

``Bobby'' (Well-acted, engrossing, more often poignant than contrived saga by Emilio Estevez entwines lives of fictional characters in Los Angeles' Ambassador Hotel on the day Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated there; William H. Macy as hotel manager, Sharon Stone as his hairdresser wife, Lindsay Lohan as a young woman marrying a pal (Elijah Wood) to keep him out of Vietnam, Freddy Rodriguez as a busboy, Laurence Fishburne as a cook. Shooting re-enacted from onlookers' viewpoint -- some splattered with Kennedy's or their own blood; characters use LSD; racial slurs; profanity; sexual innuendo; implied sexual situations; brief nudity; drinking, smoking. High-schoolers fascinated by 1960s.)

``Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny'' (Good-natured, funny, musically rich rocker/slacker buddy comedy offers mythic account of how Jack Black and Kyle Gass met and melded guitars in early 1990s to become the band Tenacious D; middle section about their vision quest to acquire (i.e. steal) the guitar ``Pick of Destiny'' gets old. Steaming profanity; explicit sexual language; depiction of an erect penis inside briefs; guitar designed to look like a woman's splayed legs; seminudity; drug use; gunfire; image of a man's head exploding; a dad (Meat Loaf) taking a belt to his son; gross toilet humor; beer drinking. 16 and older -- hopefully not younger.)