New Moon is an absorbing and transporting movie. Forget the hype and screaming 'tween and teen girls, the movie itself is extremely well directed, and acted. The "story" has a fun plot line, lots of action , angst and conflict. It also scores on the higher plane of good versus evil, love for another versus self-love. tTe special effects are excellent, the photography gorgeous. The main characters were well developed and extremely well acted for a primarily young cast. Dakota Fanning was a bore and miscast, but as the only misstep, is easily forgiven.
Nim's Island had a very creative plot and proved to be an outstanding, fanciful, beautiful and fun movie for not only kids, but adults too. Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin were outstanding. The old movie adage was true: we laughed, we cried, we were on the edge of our seats and we cheered. We were transported during the entire movie and were still talking about it the next day.