The Fa family’s only child, Mulan, fails to fulfill a Chinese girl’s traditional duty as desirable bride. When the empire mobilizes a man from every family to fight the invading Huns, Mulan fears her father, an honorable veteran, is no longer up to fighting and joins in his place, pretending to be his son. The ancestors designate the mighty stone dragon as her magical protector, but only eager baby-dragon Mushu actually goes. Mulan is assigned to general Li son of captain Fa Li’s training unit. When they reach the front, the Huns have already wiped out the regular army. Now the novice company must save China or perish honorably.
The movie has 2 classic Disney songs that kids still sing today:
I also remember playing with my Mushu (Eddie Murphy) toy as a kid, my favorite character in the movie!
Roger Radciffe and his pet dalmatian, Pongo meet Anita and her pet dalmatian, Perdita and they fall in love and get married and Pongo and Perdita have puppies. Later the puppies end up in the clutches of Anita’s hateful classmate, Cruella De Vil who is planning to make fur coats from their skin. Pongo and Perdita, with the help of a colonel, cat, horse and cows must save their puppies and bring them back home.
The movie also spawned a TV show on Disney that I loved to watch as well:
If you ask anybody, young and old, one of their favorite movies is animated. The movie may be a piece of their childhood or it may be a recent film they really enjoyed. Animated pictures are the only style of film truly created for people of all ages, race, and background. They have an ability to translate across generations and often even nations. They teach us about different virtues and life lessons while making us laugh and smile along the way. Children love the adventurous wonderment of exploring these fantasy worlds while older audiences enjoy the refreshing innocence that sends us back to a much simpler, fun time in our lives.
Because of this, I’ve decided to make a list of my favorite animated films. The process of sitting down and looking up all the movies I watched as a kid up until now was a pleasant trip down memory lane. I constantly remembered flashes of sitting in front of our big old TV and putting in a VHS or DVD after school or on a Friday or Saturday night. I quickly realized I had to put a limit on my list because there were and have been a lot of animated movies I love. The best solid, round number I landed on was 50. This allowed me to show my absolute favorites and also some of my more obscure or unknown beloved films.
The criteria for ranking them was pretty straightforward. I used 2 different factors to determine each movies spot: 1. How much did I like the movie when it first came out/when I first saw it. 2. How well does it hold up today for me and the general audience. I had a few films make the list because of the 1st and a few not make it because 2nd. Also, I have not watched all of these very recently, even though I’ll try to watch watch most of them before I reveal their ranking. That being said, some of the films have a leeway of about 3 up or down but are generally in the right spot on my list. And just as any movie and movie list, opinions change for better or worse and new movies are always being made so this is not written in stone.
In order to keep this from lasting almost 2 months, I will do 2 a day for either the first 20 or 30. So for example: 50 and 49 on Monday, 48 and 47 on Tuesday, etc. I will put a brief summary and personal review of each film along with videos (clips, trailers, interviews, behind-the-scenes).
There were a couple of films that did not make it that I felt at least deserved some recognition, even if not on my list. Some just missed the cut or I have yet to see and have heard good things about and wish to see.
These are some of the movies that I unfortunately could not fit on my list: Alice In Wonderland, James and the Giant Peach, Nightmare Before Christmas, Meet the Robinsons, Monsters Vs. Aliens, Dinosaurs, Mr. Peabody and Sherman, Brave Little Toaster, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, Despicable Me 2, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, Balto, Space Jam (felt too much of it was live action, would easily be in my top 20), Brave.
These are a few movies I have not watched yet and feel deserve recognition: Lego Movie, Frozen (Even though I hate Let It Go, especially working at a daycare), Fantasia, Fantasia 2000, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, and Bolt.
What I hope comes from people reading my list of my favorite animated movies is that people would either discover new movies they haven’t watched before or go back and watch some of them and rekindle and that childish fire in them. Here are a few videos to help ignite that fire and pump you up for number 50 and 49 tomorrow. Enjoy!
Arts And Farts Reviews 