GregHowley.com

Movie List, Age 4

August 5, 2011 - -

I take my daughter's movie education seriously. Perhaps a bit more than I realistically should. I find it important that she not watch stuff that's too mature for her (No Game of Thrones for you, little girl!) nor do I want her to reach high school having never seen the Star Wars movies. But if she sees something like Empire too soon, the amazing impact of Vader's revelation to Luke may go right over her head. Yes, these are the things that I think about - I want the ones I love to be able to enjoy the media I hold most dear.

To that end, I've compiled an age-based list of the shows that any child of mine should see. I've used the age ratings at Common Sense Media to determine the appropriate ages. They may be conservative at times, but should serve as a good baseline. Since my daughter is now four, we shall begin with the age four list. I'm leaving off the Dora, Diege, Wonderpets, and Blue Clues stuff - movies only here. I've saved the best for last in this list.

Toy Story / Toy Story 2 - Lia loves the Toy Story movies, and has since before she was four. They're great kids movies.

The Land Before Time - I'm not sure that I've ever even seen this movie, but I've heard of it, and it seems good.

The Aristocats - Isn't this the one starring Billy Joel? I've never seen it. But I'll make sure that Lia and I watch it together soon.

Winnie the Pooh (2011) / Pooh's Heffalump Movie - I've never seen these particular incarnations of Pooh, but they're now in the Netflix queue.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh - I remember growing up with this one. It's very old, and simply wonderful. I'm just a little black raincloud, hovering under the honey-tree... The quintessential Winnie the Pooh. I think I had it as one of those book/vinyl combos that I'd play on my Fisher Price record player.

Alice in Wonderland - How many times did I see this one growing up? Don't know. But we had a VHS machine and The Disney Channel. I saw it lots.

Sleeping Beauty - A classic, and Lia has never seen it. I need to get this one pronto.

I'm sure that this list will change over time, and I know for sure that I'll miss things. I'll have the age five stuff out next week. In the meantime, If you've got any great movies or shows for four-year-olds that I might have missed, please comment!

Comments on Movie List, Age 4
 
Comment Fri, August 5 - 2:02 PM by Surgoshan
Sleeping Beauty? Patriarchal heteronormativity at it's finest! You want your daughter to grow up helpless and weak and aglblaglagl!

Okay, more seriously, Disney's princess fetish aside, Sleeping Beauty is pretty horrific. Aurora/Briar Rose is nothing more than an object to be squabbled over by others. Hooray, she's pretty and can sing! Really, her only value is, as soon as she's born, as a wedding token. Then she grows up and is there to be saved.

Is it really important to make sure a four-year old gets strong, female role models (other than her mother)? I dunno, but you could avoid some of the worst of the classics.

On the other hand, you've got the Toy Opera, so there's that.
 
Comment Fri, August 5 - 2:04 PM by Greg
I should mention that I have not seen Sleeping Beauty in a few decades. I don't remember any of that stuff.
 
Comment Fri, August 5 - 9:34 PM by Surgoshan
I, likewise, haven't seen it in decades, but I know the general story.

Aurora's born and immediately engaged to some Prince. Then the King calls in the fairies to bless her with beauty and singing ability, then Maleficent shows up and curses her to die if she touches a spindle, and the third fairy switches her blessing to "will sleep until woken by love's first kiss". The King and Queen order all spindles destroyed.

Then the fairies take her to the woods to protect her or something, call her Briar Rose, and she sings to some birds. The prince she was betrothed to comes along and falls in love with her (irony! It's educational!) and sweeps her off her feet. She touches a spindle and passes right the fuck out.

Somehow she ends up in a castle surrounded by a huge briar patch and Maleficent, no longer an old woman, is now a dragon and the prince fights his way through the briar patch, kills the evil fairy/dragon, kisses the princess (now revealed as such) and hooray! End of movie.

The women who are agents are all explicitly non-human (thus excusing them taking more masculine, active roles) and one of them is evil. The protagonist is pretty much entirely passive and nothing but a victim whose life is shaped by the will of others. The hero is a dude who totally kills a bitch and then claims the woman as his prize by raping her. Yes, Disney toned it down. Just like in Snow White when, instead of being dead, SW just falls asleep, and instead of raping the corpse, the king (now a prince) just kisses her, and instead of getting kids on her with his magical king powers, he gets a wife. Fairy tales are just fucked up.

Lia's probably young enough that all of that will fly right over her head, but if you're going to go ahead with Disney's princess fetish, why not lead off with more active heroines who don't so strongly fit misogynistic gender roles?
 
Comment Mon, August 8 - 2:39 PM by Frank
Wow Surgoshan, I think you're taking a 4 year old's perception of something like Sleeping Beauty a little too seriously. My three year old daughter has seen it numerous times, and at that age all they care about are the songs, cute animals and that the bad guy is scary. I'm sure by the time Lia is six or seven Greg can start blowing her mind with appropriately strong female characterizations. If you're going to be this restrictive about the content a young girl should be watching a this ate then you might as well kiss everything goodbye except for Veggie Tales, and don't get me started on those. I think you'd be more concerned with a movie like 101 Dalmatians, where every other word is "idiot", "imbecile", "fricking" or "bloody" and half the human characters smoke profusely throughout the film. I'd rather my daughter watched Sleeping Beauty over that blatant example of bad social behavior.

As for Disney, they don't have a "fetish" with princesses, they have a team of marketing geniuses who know that little girls all want to dress up like Cinderella. If I were Disney I'd pump out a princess flick every year. Tangled was only the 10th princess movie they've done since Snow White debuted in 1937. I have to wonder if you have children based on your comments...

On to the actual movie list, I took Camryn to see the new Winnie the Pooh for her first big girl theater movie last month, and it was great. If it's still in theaters there you need to take Lia. It's only about an hour long and is really engaging for the kids. We did popcorn and the works and it was a great intro to the movie theater for her. I say doo eeet!

Alice in Wonderland is still a little surreal and confusing at that age, even the Disney version. Cam and I have watched The Secret of NIHM and she loves it despite some of the slightly spooky imagery. But pretty much any Disney flick is gold if you want to sit and watch with her. We get a lot of mileage out of Fox and the Hound, Tangled, Aladdin, Snow White, and her new favorite is Bambi 2.

In the end, you're her dad, and I think you're a pretty smart dude, so pick a movie and enjoy some time with your kiddo.
 
Comment Mon, August 8 - 4:09 PM by Greg
Lia has seen two movies in the theater, and one of them twice! Linda brought her to see Toy Story 3 twice when it was out since she loves the first two so much. Also, she saw Tangled in the theater when visiting her cousin in Kentucky and apparently fell asleep partway through. I've still never been to the theater with her.

I'm going off of the Common Sense Media recommendations for ages since I don't remember specifics of the language and themes in each movie and I wanted to figure which ones she should see first. I'll take a friend's recommendations over a random website any day though - 101 Dalmations just fell to the bottom of my 5-year-old list.

I've found that most of the movies I really want her to see are ones that she probably won't be ready for until around age seven or so. (Star Wars!)

And yeah - Surgo has no kids. :-)
 
Comment Wed, August 10 - 1:07 PM by Frank
I tried an Empire Strikes Back night with my girls about a month ago, they had both watched A New Hope with me already. Cori thought the special effects were lame, and Cam only cared when Chewy, Yoda or R2 were on screen. Ah well, I'll try again with her in a few years.
 
Comment Wed, August 10 - 1:13 PM by Greg
Special effects LAME?? Ouch! I think Star Wars's models are way better than the CG trash out there in other flicks.