Celebrate your child's love of learning
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Great Old Movies To Watch With Your Kids
Written By Ty Burr
Will your children really sit still for classic movies? Mine did. Exhausted by the same kidvid 34 times, we embarked on a tour of Hollywood's Golden Age, where they learned that black-and-white isn't medicine, the past can be magical, and Kate Hepburn is the coolest. I learned to trust my children's ability to get into old movies on their own level and share what they found with their mom and me. It's important to know your kids (I have a 12-year-old who avoids anything scary and a 10-year-old who loves gangster flicks), but in general classic films can unlock the grown-up world in ways much safer for children than modern multiplex fare. A rare home-video experience that everyone can watch together beats Shrek 8 hands down. Here's where to start.
Top Movies for Kids Ages 3-4
Top pick:
Singin' in the Rain (1951)
The first movie anyone should see. This classic musical is filmed in bright, happy Technicolor, the songs are delightful, Donald O'Connor is a clown for the ages, and the title number, with Gene Kelly dancing up a beautiful storm, will have kids imitating him for the next 10 rain showers. The story is set during Hollywood's transition to sound, so tell the kids that movies used to be silent and point out some of the goofy things (lip-synching, microphones buried in bushes) that happened once they tried to talk.
If the little ones get itchy during the plot scenes, fast-forward to the musical numbers. By the time O'Connor is jumping through walls to the tune of "Make 'Em Laugh," even the wariest of kids will be enchanted. "Moses Supposes," "Good Morning," "The Broadway Melody" (a.k.a. "Gotta Dance") — the return on these is pure joy.
Runners-up:The Gold Rush (1925)
Here's what's great about little kids: They don't know that a black-and-white silent comedy is 81 years older than Ice Age 2. They just look at Charlie Chaplin dining on his boot and think: This guy's hilarious. The Gold Rush is the one with the dance of the dinner rolls Johnny Depp imitated in Benny & Joon (a good movie for tweens and teens).
Safety Last (1923)
Everyone knows the famous image of bespectacled Harold Lloyd hanging from the face of a clock, but have you ever seen the movie it's from? This is one of the great thrill comedies of the silent era, and kids will be happily wrung out from the slapstick suspense of watching Lloyd scale that "skyscraper" (12 floors!) obstacle by obstacle.
Top Movies for Kids Ages 5-6
Top pick:
The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)
Hide the shish kebab skewers: After seeing this glowing Technicolor classic, your children will be staging sword fights all over the house. Errol Flynn remains the only Robin Hood that matters, and this fast-paced, hugely enjoyable romp plays like a picture book unstuck in time.
The plot is easy enough for a kid to figure out: Good king gone away on business, bad brother (Claude Rains as Prince John) running the country into the ground. If your child has a sibling, it'll make perfect sense. But it's the ripe performances that make this movie stick: a young and winsome Olivia de Havilland as Maid Marian, Basil Rathbone as villainous Sir Guy. Leading the charge is devil-may-care Flynn, a Saxon superhero whose powers are merely wit, intelligence, and athleticism. Beats The Rock as an action hero any day.
Runners-up:Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)
If you want to introduce kids to Judy Garland without freaking them out with flying monkeys and wicked witches, start with this homespun musical about a family in the Midwest, 1903. Garland sings the catchy "Trolley Song," but Margaret O'Brien steals the show as 5-year-old Tootie.
The Court Jester (1955)
Goofy Danny Kaye and a young Angela Lansbury star in a fast-paced knights-in-shining-armor comedy, shot in fairy-tale color. Remember: The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle.
Top Movies for Kids Ages 7-8
Top pick:
North by Northwest (1959)
By this time, classic-savvy kids are ready for Hitchcock. Start here, the master's greatest (and least scary) windup toy. Suave Cary Grant plays a man mistaken for a spy and chased all over the country, from a cornfield with a biplane attacking him to Mount Rushmore, where he scrambles down the presidential faces just ahead of the bad guys. (Hitch wanted to call the film The Man in Lincoln's Nose; cooler heads prevailed.) The movie is light, funny, and in color: a perfect introduction to suspense movies in general and Hitchcock in particular. (Besides, all young boys should know Cary Grant as a role model.)
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)
A child's first science-fiction movie — a gripping B&W drama with a spaceship, a central kid character, one of the best robots in movies, and a great secret pass-phrase: Klaatu barada nikto.
Some Like It Hot (1959)
Probably the funniest movie ever made. Too sexual for a small fry? Nope. To kids, Hot's a hilarious cartoon — it'll only seem dirty if you tell them it's dirty. There's a lot to be said for seeing old movies through young eyes.
In Singin' in the Rain, watch Gene Kelly's feet during his rain dance — the sound doesn't match the taps. Turns out wet loafers don't tap, so the sound had to be recorded later.
The shoe Charlie Chaplin ate in The Gold Rush was made of licorice. After 63 takes and who knows how many pounds of licorice, he became ill. Licorice is a natural laxative.
In Safety Last, Harold Lloyd climbed the 12-floor building with eight fingers. He had lost two fingers in an accident on the set of an earlier movie.
In the Mount Rushmore cafeteria scene of North by Northwest, you'll see a well-rehearsed little boy put his fingers in his ears before Eva Marie Saint shoots her gun.
About the Author: Ty Burr is a film critic at The Boston Globe. His latest book is The Best Old Movies for Families: A Guide to Watching Together.
