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As a kid, I was exposed to all things Disney courtesy of my family. They'd buy the crap out of Disney VHS tapes because they apparently got it in their minds that their kids are totally mesmerized by cartoons. Now it is 2012 and I only now have vague memories of these films. Let me share with you all my memories of these movies (the ones that come to mind, anyway) so I can fuel my nostalgia and brighten a dull evening.

Robin Hood: What is someone took the tale of Robin Hood and made it furry? Something surprisingly endearing. As a child, I didn't really understand what the plot was (a theme that will recur with all the following movies) but I do remember the slapstick and that one scene where Lady Kluck goes all American football on Prince John's guards. As well as that one scene where Friar Tuck goes bat**** insane when he gets captured; that part always freaked me out back then. I'm pretty sure this was the one movie I repeatedly watched the most.

101 Dalmatians: My naive child brain made me wonder where Perdita got the initial puppies from. But after that, I didn't really care, because there were shenanigans going on with Cruella and her hilarious cronies Jasper and Horace. I don't know why, but I found those two the most hilarious characters of the movie. Especially when they blindside Cruella's car and then Jasper tells her to shut up. It was indeed worth that scary-ass face Cruella makes before she rams the puppies' truck. In fact, the villains totally stole the show for me, because I actually don't remember much about the scenes with the talking animals.

The Jungle Book: I didn't find Mowgli all that appealing, really. He seemed kind of annoying. Baloo also wasn't all that great to me either, especially after getting his ass kicked by Shere Khan. And Shere Khan? Kaa? Hathi? The vultures? King Louie? Meh. But I liked Bagheera. I don't know why. Which is weird because the straight man of a group is usually the most unliked. I guess in my little child heart, I knew he was the one who was trying to do the right thing and get Mowgli back to humanity. Or maybe because he looked cool in black. I don't know. Also, I wondered if at any moment after the movie, Shere Khan is still running from that burning branch tied to his tail.

The Lion King: I remember when I was on the stairs of my old house when mom came home announcing that she bought the tape for The Lion King. It wasn't particularly exciting, but I remember it for some strange reason. I recall not being particularly surprised when Mufasa died. Maybe my child self just hasn't reached that capacity for empathy just yet. But my heart was pounding when the hyenas chased him. And, like almost every other goddamn kid who watched this, my favorite scenes were the ones with Timon and Pumbaa. Even going as far as to play this game to death and watch their friggin' cartoon.

Aladdin: This is the one Disney movie I actually remember going to the movies for. I went with my dad, which was weird because I rarely ever do anything with him. I didn't get any of the Genie's jokes. But I found Iago funny. I even watched the sequel. Don't judge me. I should really watch the second sequel, actually. Mostly because they actually got Robin Williams to reprise his role as the Genie, which is just remarkable to me. ...Well, not really. Because money.

That's all I can remember. Do any of you have any particular movies you watched as a child (not particularly animated; I was bombarded with just animated movies as a kid) that you remember fondly, changed your views of the world, ruined your life forever, etc.? Because nostalgia is a drug and you all must take a hit with me.

Actually, I'm thinking about watching these again, but Disney, with their moratorium bull**** and releasing remasters for the seventy-millionth time, make it difficult to acquire copies. MAN TOO BAD TORRENTS DONT EXIST RITE

...Actually, no. I'm scared I would get caught.

I remember watching way too many movies on VHS between the ages of five and ten, many of which were Disney. I remember Robin Hood, Bambi, Mary Poppins, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, A Bug's Life, Weekend At Bernie's (why did my parents let us watch this?), and The Jungle Book.

Pretty much any storybook movie, I watched. I wore out our Blockbuster's copy of Lady and the Tramp and distinctly remember being four and acting out part of Snow White. I went here a lot (and got the chance to revisit back in July!). I also remember really enjoying Jumanji.

Two Words: Space. Jam.

Looney Tunes + Michael Jordan + The best soundtrack EVER!? = Best movie of my childhood.

I also was quite fond of Aladdin, Robin Hood, The Sandlot, Angels in the Outfield, and The Music Man.

'Robin Hood' was my favourite Disney movie as a kid. Still is, actually. Pretty much my favourite Robim Hood movie, too.

'Last Unicorn' was great. Anyone else see that one? Sort of an early collaboration between Japanese animators and western writers---art style very reminiscent of your Captain Harlocks and Galaxy Railway 999s and such. Surprisingly deep, sad story for a children's film. One of the first times I ever heard the word 'damn' in a movie---cue scandalised giggling from five-year-old Boo. It had some really keen voice acting---Christopher Lee voiced the film's main villain (one of my favourite antagonists in all of moviedom). Angela Lansbury plays against type as an evil witch, and absolutely nails it---kind of spooky, hearing that voice used for nastiness.

'Bedknobs and Broomsticks' was awesome.

The Great Mouse Detective was and is my favorite Disney film. I watched most of the other Disney films when I was younger as well.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned any of Don Bluth's films yet. The Land Before Time, All Dogs Go To Heaven, Anastasia...

Don Bluth is godlike. I mean, dang, son...'An American Tail'? I cry erry time.

Maybe you need thicker skin or fewer daddy issues to get through that one. It just, like, obliterates me, son.

(EDIT: Oh, golly. Heavens though. You talk about crying. but 'Last Unicorn' gets me. Oh my stars.)

You really should watch the third Aladdin movie. It's really good for a DTV movie.

I watched The Fox and the Hound a ton when I was little. I love that movie. Also The Mask.

Bonus: One of my earliest childhood memories is being at my dad's house and seeing this. Like, I specifically remember that exact part. I was allowed to watch a large number of violent action movies as a young child.

The main movie I really remember liking as a child was Return of the Jedi. My friends and I used to watch that movie all the time.

Sonic 5 wrote:Bonus: One of my earliest childhood memories is being at my dad's house and seeing this. Like, I specifically remember that exact part. I was allowed to watch a large number of violent action movies as a young child.

I walked in on my dad watching the shower scene from Psycho when I was a wee thing. Scared the crap out of me.

A year or two later my grandmother was channel surfing while babysitting me and happened to settle on Carrie. You only get one guess which scene was playing.

Valigarmander wrote:A year or two later my grandmother was channel surfing while babysitting me and happened to settle on Carrie. You only get one guess which scene was playing.

There's more than one scene?

I still like most of the same movies I liked as a kid, and actually watch a few of them now and then. TMNT is awesome, and TMNT2 was pretty great. We won't talk about the third one, though.

On the subject of animated films - when I was very young they either had to have very short or obvious plots for me to follow (like Robin Hood - man, that was great as a kid - that was a Don Bluth film, btw, from before he upshot from Disney).

As I aged, though, I noticed a lot of them were just by-the-numbers productions. The whole Disney princess thing was like a wave of bile that had me backpedaling as far away from that company as possible. When the Lion King came out, I absolutely couldn't stomach the somewhat tasteless musical approach to animation that they'd begun obsessing over and the plot seemed very obvious while the immaturity in the child characters made me unsympathetic. So when I think to those films, I remember my initial reaction.

When I was young and Nintendo were also on their first upswing, as well, I can remember the Wizard film at the theater. It might not've been that great a film overall, and I definitely was confused about why they would cast someone so obviously recognisable as that kid from the Wonder Years (Fred Savage), but I loved the games background of the film and it was just bloody brilliant when they showed Super Mario Bros. 3 for the first time, because honestly no one was expecting it.


Thinking back, I've never been totally sure why people liked some films so much. ET, for instance, was very boring and pretty horrifying to me as a kid, all at once. The Labyrinth (which I think is pretty awesome, now) was absolutely horrifying due to uncanny valley and the idea that demon/goblins were listening to your every word seemed a bit too ominous. It really didn't help that the music in that was so kitsch.

When I first got into Star Wars, I would've been about 10/11 and it seemed really awesome, although I couldn't understand why Han Solo and his bear man would hang out with whiny ****s like Luke or Princess Leia.



The ones I remember best, though, are the Halloween Specials and other Holiday films like Frosty the Snowman and It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, and the Garfield Halloween Special (which is both actually funny and charming, unlike modern Garfield or most of the animated series - suggest you check it out if you've never seen it). The Halloween ones stuck with me the most.

I keep meaning to get a copy of the original Fantasia. All of the short clips I've ever seen of it (including what I think is a mountain-sized demon from the "Disney Halloween Treat" collection of villain scenes, ghosts and whatnot - narrated by a jackolantern) are just stunning.


As a very young boy, I really liked one Care Bears tape we had. Pretty certain it had the care bears as babies in some sort of flying wooden galleon? It seemed big in scope to me, and airships will always be tops in my book.




I really did love the stuff Don Bluth did while he was with Disney, though, but I feel like his quality and sense of mystery fell by the wayside. I really liked the whole concept of the Rats of Nimh/Secret of Nimh book, and the film certainly captured a piece of that, though, so it's not like he started making bad films. I bought a copy of American Tale somewhat recently. I think that was a great film, and maybe the only thing muddling it up to my adult mind was Spielberg's hand in it. The sequel (I think without Bluth) was kind of literally a trainwreck and is very straight-to-VHS.

I think I failed to mention that Aladdin was a temporarily redeeming film for me, on the subject of Disney, and that A Goofy Movie was actually pretty touching and pretty accurately captured my early teenage need for recognition and acceptance by peers and desire for pretty girls. I think they even crammed some musical into that one, though, which would've definitely gotten on my nerves.

Disney, IMO, did best with tv and comics series like Duck Tales, Rescue Rangers and Darkwing Duck.

^^All of the sequels to Bluth's stuff (except for Bartok the Magnificent & Dragon's Lair II/3-D) were made without him.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

Yeah, I kind of figured. Just thinking back on it, the whole wild-west style setting made no bloody sense coming after the whole 1920's and 30's style New York immigrant setting.

My very most special favourite was Fantasia (and wow! I had no idea it was made in 1940 originally until I looked it up for a picture... O_O). I was entranced by the music and the animation.






I also enjoy/ed a bunch of other films including Mary Poppins (I wanted her umbrella so I could fly), Bambi (made me cry buckets, though), Robin Hood, The Fox and the Hound, Lady and the Tramp (the Siamese cats were awesome!!), 101 Dalmations... and Fluppies... and tonnes more... This makes me want to go through the boxes of video tapes we have in the shed and see what else I used to watch!!! But that would mean I'd probably want half of them on DVD...