KIDS ON FILM : OC...

In an era where movie-wise kids have seen and heard all manner of R-rated lovemaking, what is there for them in complex, 200-year-old stories of thwarted love like “Sense and Sensibility,” a film without so much as a single kiss?

For Bao Truong of Westminster, it was emotion--so much in fact that the 16-year-old struggled to compose herself for minutes afterward.

“Emma Thompson did a wonderful job,” she said. “You can see her emotions. You can feel her emotions. You knew all the characters intimately. That’s why I was so overwhelmed.”

Thompson wrote the script and plays Elinor Dashwood, the sensible sister who falls for Edward Ferrars (Hugh Grant), a highly principled man who is bound by a secret promise to another. Meanwhile, her more impulsive sister, Marianne (Kate Winslet), falls for the not-so-principled Willoughby (Greg Wise), who dumps her for a woman with a bigger bank account.

As a devoted fan of Merchant Ivory films like “Howards End” and of the PBS series of the Edith Wharton novel “The Buccaneers,” Bao was sure to be hooked.

But she and her friend Nguyet Lai, also 16 of Westminster--self-described “movie nerds”--said they came mostly because of the director.

“It was Ang Lee,” Bao said. “I saw [Lee’s] ‘The Wedding Banquet,’ and I saw ‘Eat Drink Man Woman.’ ”

While the other movies focused on modern-day Chinese families, the bond between the sisters in “Eat Drink Man Woman” and “Sense and Sensibility” was nearly identical, Bao said.

The girls’ 8-year-old friend, Chris Nguyen, found the movie boring.

The personal stories of the main characters might become complex for younger viewers as they were interwoven with others--notably the older-but-wiser neighbor Col. Brandon. But Bao observed that the director made things a bit easier on moviegoers by making emotion, or rather, repressed emotion, the subject.

The girls haven’t read any Austen novels. “Pride and Prejudice” won’t be assigned reading until next year, they said. They hadn’t been interested in seeing the movie “Clueless” and said they were unaware that the plot of Austen’s “Emma” was used as the basis for the movie’s story of a ‘90s Beverly Hills teenager who finds true love in the kind but steady man, not the more popular romantic one.

As ‘90s kids themselves, they said they found a welcome calm in the simplicity of the 18th century English countryside and the politeness of society where children are told that if they don’t have anything appropriate to say, they should talk about the weather.

The only flaw they discerned was in the performance of Hugh Grant.

“I’ve never seen him in a serious role,” said Nguyet. “It was different. He did an OK job, but his face sometimes looked weird. Like it didn’t quite belong.”

His trademark awkwardness, the awkwardness they loved in “Four Weddings and a Funeral” seemed a little too awkward here.

Said Bao, “He seemed more reserved and not into his character.”