by Algy Moncrieff

Created on: December 11, 2006   Last Updated: July 09, 2009

A lot of the members of the so-called 'family' movies genre are cringe worthy films that admittedly your young children may enjoy, but you having to watch it with them will not be having such a great time. Thankfully there are a number of brilliant, mostly animated, films on the market that are clever enough to please both young and old. So here are the best few that I have seen.

1. Shrek.

This has to take the top spot. Although I haven't seen Shrek 2 or 3 I have seen Shrek a good ten times and it never seems to get old. It is a great film, whatever your age. For the kids it has lots of brightly coloured characters running around doing exciting things without being scary at all (well...I'm not three years old, but I didn't think it was scary). For the slightly more grown up viewers there is a clever additional level of ironic humour that may fly over the heads of smaller children, but will please those old enough to understand!

As well as all this there is great voice acting from Mike Myers as Shrek, Eddie Murphy as Donkey, and Cameron Diaz as Princess Fiona. Whilst not being particularly scary, the film isn't too tame either. It involves all the romantic bits, the fighting bits, all the fairytale creatures you could possibly have fond memories of, and brilliant humour. The characters are about as believable as fairytale creatures get, the action thoroughly exciting, the humour brilliant. Oh and good music too.

2. The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.

A film by the brilliant animator Nick Park, filmed in stop-motion using plasticine models, this is another of the Wallace and Gromit stories, the first in fact to be made into a full length film. It tells the story of the (humane) pest controllers Wallace and his dog Gromit who has considerably more common sense than he does, as they battle to deal with an infestation of hungry rabbits that threatens to ruin the yearly vegetable contest. Unfortunately a failed experiment at reforming the rabbits to prevent their veg ravaging ways unleashes the were rabbit on the town!

Similar in many ways to Shrek in that it has plenty of crazy, colourful animation and simpler humour to appeal to younger children as well as the clever second level, this is one of the best family movies out there. The animations are fabulously detailed and the story very cleverly written. Well worth a watch.

3. Toy Story (1 and 2)

Toy Story, a computer animated film by Pixar featuring the voices of Tom Hanks and Tim Allen, tells the story of Woody, an old cowboy toy, whose position as favourite toy is threatened by a new toy on the block; Buzz Lightyear, space ranger. The two films (and a third on the way) are both brilliant tales of how the two must overcome their differences when their quarrelling takes a turn for the worse, and Buzz suddenly needs to be rescued. Toy Story 2 is the story of a rescue mission led by Buzz to save Woody who is accidentally sold to a collector, and is, if anything, better than the first.

The characters are all incredibly likeable, and dare I say it, the story is somewhat heart warming. Yuck I hate that phrase, but it's true. Again the stories will be funny and enjoyable for adults and children alike. I look forward to the third film!

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