Children's Movies

I grew up on a film diet of Disney, Disney and more Disney. From Cinderella to The Lion King I saw them all! Back then in the mid-nineties children's films were hand drawn animations with no special effects or pressure to make them 'life-like!'

   (vanillajoy.com)

Disney are no doubt pioneers in children's movies, each one on it's own is timeless and will be passed through generations. The first movie released by Disney was Snow-White and the Seven Dwarfs, this is possibly one of my favourites and many a school play has been acted out on this story! It's not easy being all loved up when your prince is a snotty eight year old, would have prefered to stay asleep!

Probably the most prolific in my childhood was Pinochio, the story of a wooden puppet whose nose grew every time he lied;

'Pinocchio, Pinocchio,
That little wooden bloke-io,
His nose, it grew an inch or two
With every lie he spoke-io.' ( Shel Silverstein's 'Pinochio')

(disney.wikia.com)

I think my parents used these films to teach me life lessons, not that they ignored me or anything but I think it worked!

Back when these films were made, they were made with the intention of bringing happiness to the masses and to both children and adults alike, throwing in some life lessons in each.
Nowadays it is all about the x-factor, something about the film has to make it stand out from all the others in the cinema. Be that through, amazing special effects, faultless animations, all-start casts or being shown in 3D.

It is really important that children nowadays know that films don't have to be all guns blazing, special effects, fire, magic, mystical, fast-paced, adventure-epics, they can be just simple drawn animation with a simple plot line.

                                                                                    (AllPosters.com)

 The favourite film from my childhood was probably Cinderella. The poor girl who is a servant to her evil stepmother and stepsisters. She is turned itno a princess and attends the royal ball where she meets the prince charming. To sum it up, they fall in love, she goes back to being a servant but shes dropped a shoe, he tries the show on every girl in the land, finds cinderella and they live happily ever after. It is the quintessential love story that every young girl bases her future life and husband upon.

(blog.media-freaks.com)

Disney faced some slack over the lack of ethnic diversity in their films. I thought this was very unjust. I seem to recall Mulan, Pochahontas, Jasmine, the Siamese Cats and now Tiana from The Princess and the Frog have all been of an ethnic background.

It is easy to criticise Disney now but at the time this was the norm, ethnic minorities were not always represented in films. It is important that children know people come from all different backgrounds and races but saying Disney was deliberately racist is damaging for those who ere brought up on the movies and who love them for the stories they told.