Sunday, December 01, 2013

it's a parent's job to educate

Mike and I recently began this fun little project with Abby, introducing her to our favourite childhood movies. We started out with the Indiana Jones series, which she loved and we moved on to the Back to the Future series. We watched the first one this past weekend and she has declared it the best movie ever.

This project... which again, so much fun! I suggest you do this if you have suitably aged children. Maya didn't watch Indy with us, but did enjoy Back to the Future...... anyway this project has resulted in endless conversations between Mike and I about which movies should be on the list. So far it includes Ferris Bueller (for Mike as much as Abby as he hasn't seen it either!), Jurrasic Park, Gremlins, The Goonies (again Mike hasn't seen!!) and that brings us of course to Star Wars.

My question to Mike was do we show her the movies in chronological order beginning with episode one or do we show her them in the order they were released? He says we show her Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi and that's it. We ignore the other three movies. So my question to you, internet friends, is what would you do. Also a bonus question for those out there in the same age bracket... what other movies would you show her?

2 comments:

Lynn said...

Oh I love this topic! Settle in for a novel-length comment. We are doing the same with our own kids, and I maintain a huge list of Family Movie Night films in a Google Doc. The doc is sorted by suitable age range - I use the ratings from CommonSenseMedia.org, which I highly recommend if you're wondering whether something is suitable or not, or what to expect. Some films seem okay in our memories, then when we watch them they're scarier or more romantic than we remembered!

For Star Wars, I actually agree with your husband - original three, in order. Episode 1 is actually okay and enjoyable for younger kids - Maya might like that one best. But Episodes 2 and 3 are very dark, violent, and scary - definitely not for younger kids, and really, the acting and storytelling is so awful, why bother?

My movie recommendations:
Age 5/6 - All the Disney animated stuff, Kiki's Delivery Service (huge hit here), Singing in the Rain, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Pee Wee's Big Adventure, The Parent Trap (original or new, both are good), Annie, Herbie the Love Bug, Benji.

Age 7/8 - Star Wars, National Velvet, The Dark Crystal, Night at the Museum, Ella Enchanted, The Mighty Ducks, A Christmas Story, Willow, The Neverending Story (although it is awfully sad in places)

Age 9/10 - Beetlejuice, Ghostbusters, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, Ladyhawke, Strictly Ballroom, original Tron, E.T. if they can handle the sadness

Age 11/12 - Gremlins, War Games, The Karate Kid, Wayne's World, Titanic, Liar Liar, Mrs. Doubtfire

Age 13+ - Clueless, Grease, Men in Black, Ocean's Eleven, Ferris Bueller, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Big, Jurrasic Park, Say Anything

a happier girl said...

Karate Kid! My kids were doing the Crane and waxing on for days. Even the adults enjoyed it. We're doing Indiana Jones next!