Recommendations of good non-animated "family" films for two parents and a 3-year-old?

(Robyn Kozierok) wrote in message ...
In article ,
Taed Nelson wrote:
We've watched most of the recent "classics", such as those by Pixar and
Disney. Many of the older Disney ones are too violent (such as _Fox and the
Hound_) or scary. We also really like some of the anime such as _Kiki's
Delivery Service_.

My 3yo calls this movie "Kinky". As in, "I want to watch the Kinky movie."
:-O

Robyn (mommy to Ryan 9/93 and Matthew 6/96 and Evan 3/01)

When each of mine were 3 (and one still is) "Sleeping Beauty" was
"Sleeping Booty." Which probably is a real "adult title, " if you
will.

- Bev

On Wed, 9 Jun 2004 16:27:37 EDT, "Beth Gallagher" wrote:


So don't watch it! Most children will come to an age when they can handle
all of a movie like the Wizard of Oz or the real version of most children's
classics. Why water their experience down by editing it on first read or
viewing?

Because some stories are so wonderful that they're worth sharing well
before the language of the original book or the scary scenes of a
movie are appropriate. Because some kids have learning disabilities
or other reading troubles, and their parents try to expose their
imaginations to lots of stories, including ones which their peers
might be reading in the original. Because the flying monkey sequence
and the dead witch of the East under the house are small parts of the
Wizard of Oz movie, and it's possible not to pay attention to those
parts and still enjoy the movie. Because we encourage our kids to
make their own critical judgements of story treatments (comparing a
"Disney version" with its written sources, for example, or reading
fan-fiction tributes to a beloved television show and discussing how
the amateur writers succeed at duplicating the flavour of the
characters' interactions).

I recently watched a couple of plays with teenagers. For one play,
one young person had read part of the book in the original French and
complained about the quality of the translation in our library, and
the other one knew the story from a Wishbone television episode. For
my part, I didn't know the story at all, but someone at my workplace
gave me a capsule version from a movie, and I then bought an English
translation to read later. I am glad that we had so many choices of
how to enjoy this story (play, movie, Wishbone, English translation
abridged or not), without having to wade through a very thick book
written in old-fashioned French. I take the young person's word for
it that the language in the original adds to the storytelling, but I
still probably won't read it.

Louise

On Wed, 9 Jun 2004 15:58:40 EDT, Lee wrote:

jjmoreta said:

If you're worried about certain depictions in movies, there's a Christian
ministry (CAP) that analyzes movies for all sorts of things and reviews them
in excruciating detail (each review lists specific examples of violence,
sex, etc). That might be a good guide for you concerning more current
movies - http://www.capalert.com/capmarstartpage.htm.

I've never found their reviews to be of much help, perhaps
because their point of view is very different from mine.

Harry Potter is an obvious example. They go on about the
movie being 38% more "Offensive to God" than the previous
two episodes, but don't tell me about how some of the
violence in the book is handled visually. I can tell from
the commercials that the slap in the face has become a
punch in the nose. Is there an explosion with multiple
Muggle deaths? Do they reveal a nightmarish dementor face?
How bad are the injuries from falling off of broomsticks
and attacks by hippogriffs, dogs, cats, rats and trees?
And when he loses his ability to shoot web while in
mid-swing, does he fall and...oh, wait, wrong book.

This kind of thing is what www.screenit.com is really good at. They
discuss each movie under a lot of different criteria (such as
suspenseful "jump" scenes and music, topics to discuss as a family,
disrespectful behaviour, alcohol and drug use, and so on as well as
the sex and violence parts) in a way that I keep describing as
"non-judgemental" even though that sounds kinda funny. You can
probably find answers to all those questions (except the Spiderman
one) at screenit. .

Louise

Beth Gallagher wrote:
So don't watch it! Most children will come to an age when they can
handle all of a movie like the Wizard of Oz or the real version of
most children's classics. Why water their experience down by editing
it on first read or viewing?

I have no problem with your opinion, but it seems rather idiosyncratic,
and I think you're pushing it a bit much as a suggestion for others. I
don't think it takes anything away from books, movies, etc., for younger
children to enjoy the parts that are appropriate for them, and wait for
the rest until they are older. I don't have a problem with Illustrated
Classics, either!

-- David desJardins

In article , David desJardins wrote:
Beth Gallagher wrote:
So don't watch it! Most children will come to an age when they can
handle all of a movie like the Wizard of Oz or the real version of
most children's classics. Why water their experience down by editing
it on first read or viewing?

I have no problem with your opinion, but it seems rather idiosyncratic,
and I think you're pushing it a bit much as a suggestion for others. I
don't think it takes anything away from books, movies, etc., for younger
children to enjoy the parts that are appropriate for them, and wait for
the rest until they are older. I don't have a problem with Illustrated
Classics, either!

I think, that if you read rec.arts.books.children, you'd find many
people who found it objectionable to water down books for children.
It is not an unusual opinion---definitely not idiosyncratic.

Sometimes there are uses for such books (for example, we read a
"stories from Shakespeare" version of a play before going to see the
real thing, so that our son could follow the action despite the
difficulty of the language---this worked very well last year when he
was 7).


--
Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels)
Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed)
Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
Affiliations for identification only.

Hi -

Interesting thread about books watered down for kids. I have to admit,
I've never watered down anything for my two. I *have* edited which
books I offered them (until they were old enough to wander the library
on their own), and when I read aloud I often stop to explain things that
they might not already understand, but I really dislike abridge books,
etc. I also don't let my kids watch most movies unless they've already
read the book. (Some movies are better as movies than as books, even if
the book came out first. "Mary Poppins" comes to mind right away ...)

My husband and I disagree on this topic, but he doesn't care so much so
my view tends to prevail. (We did let our younger son see the Harry
Potter flicks, even though he can't really read the books yet, but
that's a rare exception.)

My feeling is that the reason a book is a classic has a lot to do with
the writing, and not just the story line. Yes, you can get something
out of an abridged version, but you lose a great deal as well. And many
kids will either *think* they already know the book, hence not read it
again when they're ready for the real thing, or else be turned off by
the abridged version when they would have loved the real thing when read
at the right time. So yes, there is a downside to seeing the movie
first, reading an abridged version, etc.

Just my thoughts,
--Beth Kevles

http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would
like me to reply.

"Beth Kevles" wrote in message
...

Interesting thread about books watered down for kids. I have to
admit,
I've never watered down anything for my two. I *have* edited which
books I offered them (until they were old enough to wander the library
on their own), and when I read aloud I often stop to explain things
that
they might not already understand, but I really dislike abridge books,
etc. I also don't let my kids watch most movies unless they've
already
read the book. (Some movies are better as movies than as books, even
if
the book came out first. "Mary Poppins" comes to mind right away ...)

My daughter badly wants to see the "Lord of the Rings" movies. I'd
really prefer she read the books, first, but even I can see that I might
be expecting a bit too much (even though I read them myself when I was
in the summer of third grade). I *have* told her, though, that she needs
to at least read "The Hobbit." My husband thinks I'm being a Mean Mommy,
and maybe I am, but reading the books was and is important to me. I have
to admit that, in part, it's a stalling technique: The Kid may well be
fearless, but even I found the Nazguls in the movie a little
intimidating. The movies are awfully dark for a kid, but then again, so
were the books.

(We did let our younger son see the Harry
Potter flicks, even though he can't really read the books yet, but
that's a rare exception.)

My daughter is old enough that she had read the "Harry Potter" books
before seeing the films. I haven't heard much about the new "Harry
Potter" movie, by the way. We'll see it no matter what, but I am
wondering how they handle the Dementors. Those guys are as creepy as a
Nazgul any day. (Please, no one tell me too much and spoil the movie for
me, though!)

By the way, I liked the "Mary Poppins" books growing up.

beeswing

In article ,
LFortier wrote:

What kind of looks do you get when he refers to the kinky
movie outside the home? :-)

Fortunately, this hasn't come up yet ;-)

--Robyn

wrote:

My daughter is old enough that she had read the "Harry Potter" books
before seeing the films. I haven't heard much about the new "Harry
Potter" movie, by the way. We'll see it no matter what, but I am
wondering how they handle the Dementors. Those guys are as creepy as a
Nazgul any day.

I just came back from Harry Potter, and I didn't think the dementors were
*nearly* as bad as I had expected them to be. (Note: I am a certified wimp
about scary movies, and found the end of the first HP pretty frightful, having
totally forgotten some of the stuff from the book and therefore having some
horrid surprises. I also took a long while to get used to Nazgul and orc scenes
when watching the LOTR movies.)

I did put my hands over my eyes a few times, but more for the werewolf.

--Helen

"David desJardins" wrote in message
...
Beth Gallagher wrote:
So don't watch it! Most children will come to an age when they can
handle all of a movie like the Wizard of Oz or the real version of
most children's classics. Why water their experience down by editing
it on first read or viewing?

I have no problem with your opinion, but it seems rather idiosyncratic,
and I think you're pushing it a bit much as a suggestion for others. I
don't think it takes anything away from books, movies, etc., for younger
children to enjoy the parts that are appropriate for them, and wait for
the rest until they are older. I don't have a problem with Illustrated
Classics, either!

Well, the exception I make to my own guideline is that if the work is really
for adults, then a child reading or seeing an edited or adapted version may
not, in some cases, be so bad. My thinking is that, by the time they get
around to reading the real thing, it will be a completely new experience for
them, and so the earlier, edited/adapted version will not interfere with the
experience of the "real thing." So, my eldest read the Illustated Classics
version of Dracula; I knew it would be a decade or more before he read the
original. I think this would be less true for entertainment or art intended
for kids, in which case there may be only a 1- or 2-year gap between the
time the child reads/sees the edited version and the time (s)he is ready to
see/read the real thing.

Note also that I'm not necessarily talking about not letting a child see an
entirely different version of a story, e.g., Disney movie vs. Grimm Bros.
translation or the Wizard of Oz movie vs the book. Those cases need to be
taken individually. I'm talking about single versions, e.g. The Wizard of Oz
movie with fast-forwarding vs without. And if you're talking about a piece
of crap, . . . well, feel free to fast-forward/edit/etc. to one's delight.
My interest is in preserving, for my own kids, great cultural experiences,
not in being a purist for its own sake.