I’m not sure where you usually bring your kids to during the school holidays but whenever school is out, I’d bring my son traveling. To me, nothing could help us to bond more than spending time together on our family trips. Our family trips are usually backpacker style and the destinations are always those away from the city and closer to nature.

Of course, there are times that the school break is too short to plan any trips and my husband and I opt to bring our son to the cinema for a movie treat or a full scale movie marathon instead. Cinema, you say, why cinema? Some would say that cinema is fairly an odd place to bond with your kids.

Well, truth be told. Cinema is fast becoming my favourite hangout place mainly because all three of us would actually snuggle together and enjoy what’s being shown instead of me and my husband glancing down on our respective smart phones, trying to catch up with work. You see, apart from places of worship, cinema is probably the only fun place that does not allow gadget usage during showtimes. Everyone will have to put away whatever gadgets that they have whenever they are in cinema, and this is absolutely good for us.

Yes. We are guilty of being overly attached to our gadgets, that but trust me, we do make effort to disconnect to reconnect and spend some quality time as a family.

Problems? Yes. Our son is still in primary school and movies have to be carefully selected in order to suit his age. My husband and I will usually choose children friendly movies or at the very most, movies rated PG-13 to watch together with our son during our movie outings so that he won’t only have fun, but benefit educationally from the movies.

Most of the movies that we watched are from fantasy and fiction genre, but here’s recommending a very good movie that you can watch with your family for the upcoming school holiday; The Kid From The Big Apple.

Anyway, no spoilers for the movie from me over here. There’s no joy in spoiling anyone’s fun in giving spoilers but I vouch for this movie and highly recommends it if you want to have a movie outing with your family that will not embarrass you with profanities or inappropriate scene.

Check out the summary below:

The Kid From The Big Apple

Cast List
Ti Lung(狄龙）： Ah Gen 阿根(The Grand Father)
Jessica Hester Hsuan(宣萱）： Sophia Lin(The Mother)
Sarah Tan(陈沁霖）： Sarah Lin 林思家(The Grand Daughter)
Jason Tan(陳智深): Ah Bao 家宝(The Boy Next Door)

Award List:

1. Macau International Movie Festival 2015, Best Female Supporting Cast – Jessica Hester Hsuan
2. Macau International Movie Festival 2015, Best Male Supporting Cast – Tik Lung
3. Macau International Movie Festival 2015, Best Scriptwriter – Jess Teong
4. Macau International Movie Festival 2015, Best Newcomer – Sarah Tan
* Macau International Movie Festival 2015, Official Selection Movie

Nominations
1. Official Finalist Hollywood, Screenplay Contest 2014
2. Official Finalist New York, Screenplay Contest 2013

The Kid From The Big Apple tells the story of a little girl from New York by the name of Sarah Lin whose mother is a single mother. She’s all dandy in New York but one day, her mother had a little work crisis in China and had to send Sarah to her estranged grandfather who is living in Malaysia until the problems resolves. Naturally, being well settled in New York, Sarah rebelled against the decision and all hell breaks loose when she was sent to her grandfather.

There’s language barrier between the granddaughter-grandfather, culture shock, generation gap and many more.
The movie is not only fun but is packed with moral values that kids these days could possibly learn. A forewarning, though. This movie is both laughter inducing and at the same time, an effective tearjerker.

There’s plenty of heartwarming and touching scene that will most probably tickle your funny bones but at the same time, make you sob your head off.

This is definitely a child friendly movie, I must say. I can guarantee that by the time you leave the cinema, you and your children will be taught a lil bit about appreciating life’s little pleasure, honoring friendship, family ties, bridging the generation gap, filial piety and most importantly, lifelong learning.

Here’s a little bonus for your conscience should you really watch this movie; part of the profit from this movie will be channeled to Mah Sing Foundation for the needy. Isn’t that great? You can have a clean good fun time with your family and at the same time, give back to the society.

The Kid From The Big Apple will be screened in cinemas nationwide from 10th March 2016. Early bookings is recommended to avoid disappointments.