Wednesday, October 18, 2006

My Favorite Movies (family-friendly!)

If you're looking for a fun family-friendly movie to watch, I'd recommend these. The movies with asterisks are good enough to watch again and again. All of the movies should be OK for teenagers and many for younger children, but you'll want to do more research before letting your kids watch if you're not sure. Some are certainly better to watch on TV (edited) or through VidAngel.

The movies are ordered alphabetically, and none are Rated-R. I listed my favorite Latter-day Saint-themed movies separately.

If you have other favorites, please share!

LATTER-DAY SAINT ORIENTED
  • *The Best Two Years
  • The Other Side of Heaven
  • *Singles Ward
SCI-FI/FANTASY
  • *Back to the Future (all three)
  • *Independence Day (fabulous speech by the President)
  • Galaxy Quest
  • Hell Boy
  • *Lord of the Rings trilogy
  • Men in Black
  • Star Trek.  My favorites:
    • *The Wrath of Khan
    • *Insurrection
    • First Contact
    • The Undiscovered Country (some of the best lines from any of the ST movies)
    • The Voyage Home
  • *Star Wars (all nine--my favorites: Return of the Jedi, Revenge of the Sith, and Rise of Skywalker)
  • X-Men
ACTION/SUSPENSE/DRAMA
  • *Apollo 13
  • *Big Trouble in Little China
  • Cast Away
  • *First Knight
  • Forrest Gump
  • The Fugitive
  • *Hunt for Red October
  • Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
  • The Man in the Iron Mask
  • Minority Report
  • *Mission Impossible (all but the second one)
  • *National Treasure
  • Ocean's Eleven
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
  • Raiders of the Lost Ark
  • Rudy
  • School Ties
  • Sneakers
  • Swing Kids
  • Signs
  • The Sixth Sense
  • Superman
  • The Village
FAMILY
  • Beauty and the Beast
  • *The Emperor's New Groove 
  • Freaky Friday (the remake with Jamie Lee Curtis)
  • Harry Potter (all of them)
  • The Lion King
  • The Little Mermaid
  • *A Little Princess
  • *Mulan (the cartoon)
  • Remember the Titans
  • Toy Story
COMEDY 
  • Ace Ventura: Pet Detective 
  • Black Sheep 
  • *A Christmas Story 
  • Dave 
  • Legally Blonde 
  • *Maverick 
  • *Napolean Dynamite 
  • *National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation 
  • *The Princess Bride (great lines) 
  • *The Private Eyes (with Don Knotts) 
  • Rush Hour 
  • *The Scarlet Pimpernel (hilarious) 
  • *Shanghai Noon 
  • Tommy Boy 
  • Zoolander
OLDIES BUT DEFINITELY GOODIES 
  • *Casablanca (so that's where all the Bugs Bunny lines come from!)
  • North by Northwest 
  • *Rear Window (exciting!)

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are the first person I've ever come across that liked Hell Boy. Interesting. I've never seen it (nor will I), but I've only heard (sharply) negative reviews from friends and others.

Bookslinger said...

LDS oriented movies I like:

Baptists at our Barbeque.
Mobsters and Mormons.
Work and the Glory, Pillar of light (pt 1).
Work and the Glory, American Zion (pt 2).

Anonymous said...

Comedy- The Man Who Knew Too Little. Bill Murry as an American in who thinks he's in a participatory theater on the streets of London, but he's really involved in a plot to revive the Cold War.

Anonymous said...

Great list! I'd add "Rat Race" to the comedy sections. Never laughed so hard.

Anonymous said...

May I also recommend IMAX documetaries like SolarMax (solarmovie.com) and David Attenborough's Life of Birds. IMAX (on DVD) is definitely some of the best family-quality programming I have ever seen.