I am a movie lover and have been known to sit through many a teen-angst B movie on a Saturday afternoon because the movie-ness is so delicious and it's completely mindless entertainment. Sometimes you just need that. I can watch all kinds of movies: action, comedy, thriller, horror, romance, drama, whatever. I like good movies, so-bad-they're-good movies, and even some lame movies. I can just as easily sit through Pride & Prejudice as I can Twilight or 10 Things I Hate About You. You know what kills me though? Kid movies.
To say I'm unimpressed with children's movies is an understatement. I loathe children's movies. Everything is too over-the-top, have-to-outdo-the-competition. They are loud, garish, and unimaginative. It's a sad state of affairs when the last children's movie that I *loved* was The Incredibles. Nothing since then has really floated my boat--or my kids' boat, for that matter. I have been entertained, mind you, but it wasn't sensational. Current movies don't strike me the way movies did when I was a child. I would tend to think it's because I'm watching with different eyes now, but my own children don't seem to be impressed with the movies any more than I am.
You know what has them talking? The movies I watched when I was a little girl. So far I've shown them the following:
They loved every single one of those* and asked to watch them over and over. I could have predicted the cool factor of the light saber, but who knew a flying Winnebago would be so enticing?
(* OK. Chlihead, Jr. did not like Clue or The Private Eyes. She disliked them because she viewed it as confirmation that anyone could be murdered any time for any reason and that scared the dickens out of her. Lesson learned on my part. I honestly thought the humor would outweigh the obviously fake murders. I saw The Private Eyes when I was her age and loved it. It's very un-PC, though. Seriously. So if that offends you, stay away.)
We have a DVD case that holds 200 DVDs. It's not completely full, but it's getting there. Nothing in that case has been watched (except for The Little Rascals) unless there is absolutely no other choice or we're on a road trip. I'm loathe to purchase any more movies. Indeed, I've told the kids they have to pony up their allowance for any new movies. Not that they've asked because guess what? Nothing's good enough to buy. Right now I think we're all content to let Netflix ship us the next blockbuster from the 70s and 80s.
We currently have in our Netflix queue:
- For the Love of Benji
- Splash
- Ghostbusters
- Teen Wolf
- Old Yeller
- Adventures in Babysitting
- Big
- What About Bob?
- The Karate Kid
- Pee-Wee's Big Adventure
- Back to the Future 3
It's true: none of those are earth-shattering choices with great lessons to be learned. But you know what? They don't have all the dazzle; they just have jokes. Most of them have an interesting story to boot.
I understand that many of these movies also contain language not fit for little ears. I was never restricted in what I could or couldn't watch while I was growing up and I think I turned out OK. I generally know what my kids can handle and they know what our rules are. Just because some guy in a movie says a certain word, doesn't mean it can come out of your mouth without a consequence. You can absolutely laugh at it, though.
What about you? What movies do you remember from your childhood that you think today's kids would enjoy? Have you shown them to your kids yet? I need some more ideas.