the top ten:

# Bicycle Thieves (Vittorio De Sica, 1948, Italy)
# ET The Extra-Terrestrial (Steven Spielberg, 1982, USA)
# Kes (Ken Loach, 1969, UK)
# The Night of the Hunter (Charles Laughton, 1955, USA)
# Les Quatre Cents Coups (François Truffaut, 1959, France)
# Show Me Love (Lukas Moodysson, 1998, Sw/Dk)
# Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, 2001, Japan)
# Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995, USA)
# Where is the Friend's House? (Abbas Kiarostami, 1987, Iran)
# The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939, USA)

Where's Raiders?

Never mind, I RTFA, but I didn't RATFL.

Full Metal Jacket.

Kids (Larry Clark)

no but seriously, that's a nice list.

What, no Deep Throat?

agreed mr.marx

Cronenberg's Crash.

Every Child under the age of fourteen should watch Raiders of the Lost Ark 50 times.

A Day at the Races
Good call.

Seriously, though, I love the BFI. The AFI can go fuck itself. Those AFI Top 100 lists make me want to slit my wrists.

What, no Deep Throat?

I actually misread the post title "The filthy films your child should see."

These things just beg to be challenged, don't they?

Decent list, although they omitted a few that I think are must-sees.

The Neverending Story - West Germany, USA - 1984
Cinema Paradiso - Italy 1989 (older kids)
The Black Stallion - USA 1979
Mononoke-hime - Japan 1997 (also known as Princess Mononoke)
the PBS (I think) film adaptation of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe - UK - 1988
The Secret of NIMH - USA - 1982

I actually misread the post title "The filthy films your child should see."

*starts sobbing uncontrollably*

iconomy, that would make three Miyazake flicks on the list.

I wish they would have the guts to choose just one. Don't get me wrong, they're fun, but for a "best of" list, I'd choose Mononoke-hime over Tonari no Totoro and Spirited Away.

Also Toy Story deserves to be there, but that fish movie doesn't. Along the same line of complaint.

Many of these movies are more like "The films you should make your child sit through whether they like it or not."

but that fish movie doesn't

I agree about Mononoke and I agree about the fish movie - nowhere near as good as I expected and hoped.

Oh and no original Willy Wonka? Come on. Also I'd rather any kid watch Nightmare Before Christmas over Edward Scissorhands. I demand a recount.

Mononoke is right at the top of my all-time favorites but I don't know how I'd have liked it as a young'un.

The Last Unicorn might belong on the list, too. You want to see that when you're young... grown up, I can't watch the damned thing without waterworks commencing from the first strains of music.

ok, if by the fish movie you mean nemo, i disagree. it's great for kids and adults on repeated viewing, unlike the lion king which i have never seen all of but people under a certain age know by heart.
i was about to say the unicorn movie but i meant one older and not animated about a goat with a mutant horn that i bet Barnum and Bailey stole the idea from.
The Narnia thing is actually a BBC version of the Lion, the Witch... i think.
and i always thought it was the bicycle thief so is this another movie?
i want to see the spy kids stuff because i like R. Rodriguez and his in house set up on digital video.
i wanna see a lot of kid things.
i want to put school house rock on there for US kids if that qualifies as required viewing.
And the Little Prince, everything with Danny Kaye, almost everything with Gene Wilder, half the things with Audrey Hepburn, and probably more once i have some tea.

Hello, BFI? To Kill a Mockingbird? I mean, come on!

That "on repeated viewing" is a challenge I will not take up, sorry. I don't believe, in my case, that it will work.

I loved Pinnochio as a squirt (and think it contains valuable lessons, taught convincingly), but I've long given up hope of anyone putting it on these lists. *sour grapes*

I would add The Birds to the list, though. Most of the kids I know find it alternately hilarious and scary.

The Black Stallion, yes yes, iconomy! And The Little Mermaid.

Wolfdog, I watched The Last Unicorn a week or two ago (not having seen it since I was a kid), and was sadly horrified at the music. Sorry, but instead of my eyes filling with tears, my ears were filled with the cheesiest schlock! My friends and I giggled uncontrollably every time a new song started.

Actually, yes, Finding Nemo is a major mistake on the part of the BFI. It could be easily replaced by any of a number of facile, melodramatic pop-entertainments created by the major animation studios that only serve to reinforce the self-serving and self-perpetuating values of the corporatist hegemony. Toy Story doesn't belong there either. "Oh, but it's so cute and clever and funny!" Well fucking duh. Propaganda is supposed to be charming and to appeal to both emotion and bias, and furthermore...

Okay, I'll stop.

This isn't something I mean, but since nobody else has said it:

BFI should stick to garbage.

Wow, gramschmidt, what's your beef with Toy Story? My young'un went through a looong period where that's all she wanted to see and it magically never grated on my nerves. And what do you mean by "propaganda?" (Not being combative, just curious.)

And sorry Specklet, but the feminist in me HATES the Little Mermaid. Changing who you are and cutting off your family for a man? Hell no.

(And don't even get me started on the communist undertones in the Rainbow Fish books...)

Whoa, I think we need The Neverending Story here.

labyrinth! remember not to forget your baysitting duties!
the dark crystal!
something else i feel exclamatory about!
i just drank coffee!
i need to do laundry!

Has anyone seen The Secret of Roan Inish? It's one of the most charming and beautiful children's films I've ever seen. And definitely not just for children. It's just mesmerizing. And so I add it to my list. There! It's added.

does anyone know of a film of A Wrinkle In Time? if it sucks, then i'd like to know.
also, i remember being enthralled with Escape from Witch Mountain and pippi longstocking.

i always thought it was the bicycle thief so is this another movie?

it's been translated literally, the original is "Ladri di Biciclette", ie "Bicycle Thieves"

Secret of Roan Inish is one of my favorite films - it made my kids go "meh."

more stop animation and kung fu
kids need discipline
like spinning a long stick around the edges of a saucer
and not lowering their arms lest they be gored by knives

and comic books
because with great power comes greater access to better comic books

and godzilla
because monsters listen to little children

And that rick mayall show with the animated fairy tales and the baba gaga chicken leg chair

and that pbs story of the african folk tale about the man who "forsook those who loved him for those who did not"
and i love my totoro
*hugs it like a bunny*
stops drinking coffee

I thought the title was "The Filthy Films Your Child Should See" and thought it was some kind of twisted take on those fundy Xtian movie sites that describe all the naughty parts in excessive detail.

obTopic: I have seen Roan Inish, and agree that it's great.

Well, if their "day at the races" is the Marx Brothers version...we're way ahead of the game. My two year old does a mean Groucho impression. Earlier this week, I bought him a lap harp (because it was cool), and as he was plucking at it, he said "Look Mama! I'm Harpo. Honk! Honk!" So apparently, bike horns and harps are indelibly combined in his mind. (We have Matteo to thank for the richness of Marx Brothers experience. :)

Monsters Inc., should have been on the list, IMHO. It's a great movie for teaching kids not to be afraid of the dark/monsters/shadows.

Toy story is too spooky for really young kids, I think. Spooky toys are one of those things that can haunt you for years.

My husband brought home Bambi...which means I have to sit there with a the dvd controller to make sure we miss the Mommy dies scene that seems like an imperative part of every damn disney movie. What the hell is with that?

Finding Nemo...he loves that movie. Loves it. It's a good thing we have it on DVD...cause we would have worn a tape out...but because it's Disney (isn't it?), of course, Mommy dies...so we have to start the movie about 10 minutes in when Nemo is waking up Marlin to go to school.

Dumbo...totally forgot about the mommy death in that one. Is there any Disney movie that the parents make it out alive, or don't abandon their kids? Disney has a little cartoon snuff factory going. Seriously: A Bugs Life, Aladdin, Atlantis, Bambi, Beauty and the Beast, Brother Bear, Cinderella, Dinosaur, Dumbo, Finding Nemo, Hunchback of Notre Dame, Jungle Book, Lilo & Stitch, The Lion King, The Little Mermaid, Peter Pan, Pinocchio, Pocahontas, The Rescuers, Snow White, Tarzan, Toy Story, Toy Story 2;

Every single one of them either has the mother die, or the Father is MIA, or both parents are dead, or have abandoned their child. WTH? I never noticed it until I had a kidlet the right age for the movies...but damn, that's weird.