List Price: $9.95Price: $7.97 You Save: $1.98 (20%)as of 03/17/2010 18:35 EDT
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Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9780767879682
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
ISBN: 0767879686
Label: Sony Pictures
Languages: EnglishUnknownEnglishOriginal Language
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Sony Pictures
Release Date: June 03, 2003
Running Time: 96 minutes
Studio: Sony Pictures
Theatrical Release Date: 2001
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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com:
Keeping secrets is difficult and, sometimes, unhealthy. Emily (Evan Rachel Wood) discovers a talent for keeping secrets early in life and deems the skill marketable enough to open her own neighborhood business. Emily is also an amazing violin player with high aspirations for a musical career. Secret-keeping proves lucrative at first, but eventually the burden weighs on Emily and affects her ability to concentrate, hurting her chances of making the local youth symphony. Resolving her dilemma requires the help of two new friends, her violin teacher, parents, and a fair amount of soul-searching. Eventually, Emily's journey leads to the dissolution of her business and a cathartic revelation of a major secret of her own. The moral of Emily's experiences: "You can't keep secrets about yourself and live a true life," and "if you want to be close to someone, you can't keep secrets from them." (Ages 7 and older) --Tami Horiuchi
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
Like another recently reviewed film, what irritates the heck out of me is that no one ever hears of films like this. In this case, the date of the film, 2001, gives us a clue as to why it fell through the cracks. After 9-11, no one had much taste for film. Bad timing.
Well: GET THIS NOW AND LOVE IT!! Evan Rachel Wood, charmingly willowy and adolescent here, plays a musical prodigy (violin) who moonlights as the neighborhood secret-keeper. She dispenses advice after hearing secrets, ranging from how best to hide the evidence of broken heirlooms to how one can masquerade as one's older sister. All her clients are delightfully under 10 years of age, and great little actors. The little girl who's dying for a collection of real cats and the intrepid autistic boy who finds a Tyrannosaurus Rex while digging to China are the show stealers at this stage of the film. If only the secret keeper can help the girl cope with the cats she's cat-napped, and help the boy decide how to handle his paleontological find!
Enter the magnificent Michael Angarano ("Sky High", "Forbidden Kingdom"), who is just now hitting his stride as a major star. Lanky and hilarious, with twitches and facial expressions that put the young Shia La Boeuf to shame, he appears as the new guy in town (which is implied to be Somewhere, Florida but is actually Salt Lake City, Utah).
With his flippant yet clumsy view of the world, he befriends Evan the Secret Keeper--then the fur flies when they all discover that secrets are not to be taken lightly...or piled steadily onto anyone's shoulders. The film ends beautifully with all the kids and the rest of the characters fessing up, thereby destroying the ugly karmic cycle of secret-keeping.
I was moved by a scene early in the film when Evan tells one of the children, "This isn't confession!"--I roared because that is exactly what it was. It was a place the children could tell their secrets (confess) and get guidance/comfort (absolution). If Catholic priests can't get it right, how on earth did this genuis-IQ 16 year old girl think she could do it?!
There is no swearing, and I cannot fathom the stupid PG rating on this G-quality film. (Except to repeat here the immortal words of Emma Thompson, who said that "a G-rating is the kiss of death for any film.") The performances are charming and real--the kids steal the show but not enough to make them look silly Disney-esque ragamuffin show-stealing.
Watch Evan move beautifully, like a young Grace Kelley: nonetheless we do not forget she's a sweet 16. Watch Michael Angarano, who doesn't hide even at this age (12) his beautiful, powerful physical abilites, yet he remains ever the weedy-help-me-I'm-stuck-in-puberty nerd.
Toward the end, though we know it all along, this film magnificently soars as a morality play. It sears and pierces the soul somewhat like Shakespeare--if he were alive today, I'll tell you: THIS would be his favorite film.
I can say--my wife will agree here--this film elicits laughter, tears and everything in between. Too few films like this, in our modern age dominated by either nonstop brainless action or gratuitous gross-out fests. This movie is rare, absolute fun.
Rating:  -
We borrowed this movie from a friend for my daughters to watch in the car during a trip. Both of my daughters loved it, but especially my 8 year old. She wants to watch this every day, quotes lines from it, and talks about it. It's a good story with good lessons for young kids. With all the trash out there for kids today...this one stands out. And my daughter wouldn't let me rest until I bought it for her after I had to return the borrowed one.
Rating: -
This is one of those movies that is great for the whole family, young to old. It has enough fresh comedy to keep you laughing, and the proper drama to grip you and feel the emotion that the writers intended. Purchased for my nieces and they enjoyed it a lot when we watched it as a family on movie night.
Rating: -
David Lynch's "Blue Velvet" starts with some great images: ideal suburbia - kids crossing the street, firemen waving as they go down the road on their truck, and a man watering his garden. Then the guy has a stroke and collapses. We are then treated to the best shot of the film: his dog playfully jumping around the squirting hose he continues to hold as a toddler ambles toward him. Then the camera moves down for a macro shot of the insect world in his lawn, introducing the film's theme that there is a secret and much nastier world just below the surface of "Norman Rockwell" suburbia.
In "Little Secrets", Emily runs a business which keeps all the neighborhood secrets in a safe place for a fee. It takes Lynch's dark theme and turns it into a lesson about friendship and trust. Apparently this thematic content is the reason the film was given a PG rating, although it is hard to imagine that anyone would think this film required "parental guidance".
The film features a decent performance from Evan Rachel Wood (Emily), although there is nothing here that would lead anyone to think she was capable of her breakout performance in "Thirteen". Michael Angarano (Phillip) is fantastic opposite Wood and they have a nice chemistry. David Gallagher does a good job in a small role that is unnecessarily tacked onto the story, presumably to capitalize on his "7th Heaven" popularly. Blair Treu, the film's director, should have recognized in mid-production that a better resolution would have been the pairing of Emily and Phillip rather than Emily and David. It was an easy fix, minor rewrites and re-shooting a couple scenes to make Phillip the same age as Emily, they certainly look the same age. Gallagher's drawing power did not save the production commercially (it tanked big time at the box office) so they ruined the ending for nothing.
The director of photography used a lot of great crane shots and creative camera angles but overall the the shots should have been tighter (i.e. closer shots of the faces and eyes). One exception was Caitlin E. J. Meyer (Isabelle) who the camera loves and who steals her scenes as the nine-year old younger sister of Emily's best friend. Isabelle has the movie's best line "Life is complicated when you look like Claudia Schiffer".
This is a very original premise, a well-conceived and rather profound story. It should really appeal to those who liked "The Boy Who Could Fly" and "Harriet The Spy".
There is one especially good scene when the web of secrets starts to crumble. First Emily is angry at David because he was caught drinking which was his secret, making David angry at Phillip for telling Emily his secret, which makes Phillip angry at Emily for telling David that he had told her David's secret. "What a tangled web we weave...."
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
Rating:  -
While this film was engaging on many fronts, I could not bring myself to enjoy it. It injected a fantasy world into the minds of our young children, synonomous with an opiate. While I do enjoy children's films, I found it was not up to par with the latest in children's technology (Spy Kids 3-D is a good example of this). The acting was paralled by Keanu Reaves - outright silly! The story was not compelling enough to bring me to the edge of my seat. I could not recommend this film to any family household. If you're looking for a great cinema for your Parker Brother's night, check out Slam Dunk Ernest.
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