It’s incredibly easy for children to latch onto one piece of media and refuse to budge from it for a long time, especially when it comes to movies . Their favorite movie plays such a large role in their life, one they watch over and over again, much to the chagrin of their parents .
A Reddit post asked people to share the childhood movies that are still loved today, and people were beyond happy to share their answers.
*Back to the Future*.
“I’m confident that I’ve watched BTTF more times than any other movie. I wore it out on VHS as a kid. Now I’ve watched it many times with my kids who also love it. Sharing your childhood favorites with your kids and watching them experience them for the first time is a really fun part of being a parent.”
*Mrs. Doubtfire.*
“My lawyer gave this movie to me when I was five and living through a violent divorce. Spent a few years believing I was Mara Wilson and my dad would come back as a Scottish Nanny. It wasn’t really appropriate for a five-year-old and some of the humor is quite dated, but it’s one of my favorites. To the lawyer’s credit, it did help me understand custody battles, so there’s that.”
*Toy Story*.
“Honestly, I think I like Toy Story more as an adult than I did as a kid. I don’t think I had watched it in over a decade but we recently got Disney+ and flipped it on for my daughter to watch and it’s crazy how many jokes / quips went over my head as a kid.”
*Jurassic Park*.
” Jurassic Park I think holds up incredibly well, probably because of the animatronics. Nobody’s going to spend the time and money on that any more but it’s honestly more realistic than CG and doesn’t have the uncanny valley issue going on.”
*Lilo and Stitch*.
“When I was a kid, I just liked the parts with Stitch and Lilo, but now I just look at the movie from an adult’s point of view while I watch it,” explained one reply. “During the scene when Lilo is in Cobra Bubble’s car, you can hear Nani crying desperately as she says ‘Please don’t take her. She’s all I have. I need her’. It brings tears to my eye every single time.”
*Home Alone*.
“I watched a behind the scenes of Home Alone the other night and it blew my mind. They shot all the interior scenes on stages they built in an abandoned school. The part where the basement gets flooded was a stage built into the school’s pool. It’s a pretty fun story of how that movie got made.”
*The Last Unicorn*.
“I read the book last year and it gave the story new resonance. I think it’s actually more relevant as I’ve gotten older.”
“You beat me to it,” replied another user. “Wonderful artwork, great story, memorable characters. The whole thing just seems magical.”
*Matilda*.
“I just introduced Matilda to my kids, and they all loved it. Now my oldest watches it all the time, whenever she can. We watch it together a lot, and it sometimes gets me a little teary to think of her loving this movie that I’ve loved for so long and us watching it together. It’s just a great movie all around.”
*Land Before Time*.
“I’ve got an aunt who’s a kindergarten teacher and she always shows it to her students. We just bought her a complete collection of all the DVDs. She says that the kids always go home begging their parents to buy copies so they can watch the movies at home […].”
*Princess Mononoke*.
Many noted that, while the movie is incredible, it scared them the first time they watched it as young children. The original commenter returned to agree: “I was probably around 6 or 7 the first time I watched it, I was terrified too! But it also fascinated me deeply, thats the kind of stuff I generally have the most fun with. Embrace the fear, push through til the end.”
*Terminator 2*.
“Saw this when my son was a few months old. I could totally identify with Sarah Connor. I knew from the moment my baby was born I would go through h**l and high water to keep him safe, and help him be whomever he was meant to be. I love the character.”
*The Addams Family*.
Beyond the replies being filled with iconic quotes was someone pointing out how perfect a couple Gomez and Morticia are: “After seeing so many couples hating each other in movies growing up, the way that Gomez and Morticia are just genuinely over the moon for each other always struck me as so wholesome and my ideal to strive for.”
*Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark*.
“I saw the original release. The kid in elementary school who told me to see it sounded like he was describing a fever dream. When I saw it it was everything he described and more. In fact I just watched it this year and was amazed at how tight the film still is, it still runs by very quickly and never wastes a moment of screen time.”
*The Mummy*.
A sweet story was told in one reply: “The first and second Mummy movies have been my favorites since I first watched them as a kid. Every couple of months or so I’ll come in and rewatch the two of them again, just cus they’re so fun and amazing.
“It doesn’t hurt that my now husband kissed me for the first time while I was introducing him to the first one. Fond memories.”
*The Sandlot*.
“My parents said I watched this every day and as a kid I had pf flyers or something similar and a button up jersey. I used to re-enact Benny the Jet Rodriguez pickling the beast […] for the Babe Ruth ball. The little grinding of his fingers together and twisting his shoe in the dirt off to a dead sprint… that was me.”
*Labyrinth*.
“Yes! It’s so good! I’m a sucker for musicals and I feel like watching the Labyrinth as a kid might be to blame for that. I’m not sure if you would classify it as a musical itself, but the soundtrack bangs!”
*W***y Wonka and the Chocolate Factory*.
“Gene Wilder really made that movie what it was and even then he had to sleep on it for 20+ years until it finally got it’s due praise when released to home video. It was a flop in the theaters and passed over by critics. Only in the 90’s when they decided to do a video re-release was it finally praised. He insisted that he got extreme liberties to script which resulted in some of the most impressive scenes.”
*Anastasia*.
“She’s the best Disney Princess, and I’ve been saying that for years even before the official Fox merger!
“So many people discard it because ‘Bluth was just copying the Disney formula.’ And yeah, it sort of is. But he did that formula better than Disney did so who cares. […]_ Anastasia_ is awesome. Awesome music, visuals, characters, and both leads are distinct and matter.”
*Who Framed Roger Rabbit?*
” Who Framed Roger Rabbit? is such a well done film and has such an incredibly well written script that the author of the original novels retconned the story in the sequels to follow the movie’s story instead.
“This film is the best example of a derivative work being exponentially better than the source material.”
*Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles*.
“It only gets better with time. The themes of disillusionment of youth coming of age, the guiding power of fathers for their sons, the strength of brotherhood when limits are tested, the consequences of sins of the deep past and fate that follows across decades and continents, the turmoil of outsiders and misfits seeking their place in a brutal and indifferent society. […] This movie would have been a success no matter what; they did not need to make it a masterpiece. But they did, and I love it more every time I watch it.”
Last Updated on September 8, 2021 by Daniel Mitchell-Benoit