GregHowley.com

Age seven is where my list begins to get truly magical. Comparing the age six and age seven lists, it's like night and day. Age seven seems to be where you can begin to show kids some movies that don't one hundred percent qualify as kids-only movies.

• Star Wars: A New Hope - Before all the parentage complexities and the galactic politics of later movies in this series, there was the simple story of a boy who endured tragedy and left his home planet to do battle against the greatest evil in the galaxy. It's Star Wars. Does it get any more epic than this?
• E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial - I saw E.T. in the theater, which by my calculations means that I was eight years old. The government scientists were a bit scary, but it's a one of the best kids' adventure stories ever. The group of kids riding bikes through sand pits while fleeing cars has stuck with me for years. The movie itself has strong ties to the eighties, so I'm not sure how much today's kids will identify, but I enjoyed Stand By Me, so maybe today's kids will enjoy E.T.
• Explorers - Another amazing kids' adventure story. I really like these. This one may appeal to me because it largely involves computers, even if the PC in question is an early-eighties Apple IIe. The movie's ending got weird, but everything up until that point - the experimentation - was absolutely stellar. It felt like Tony Stark experimenting with the Iron Man suit soon after having built it.
• The Dark Crystal - We own a copy of The Dark Crystal. Linda doesn't have as much an affinity for the movie as do I, but I still remember the first time I saw it - it was over a neighbor's house on HBO. To me, The Dark Crystal was like Fraggle Rock: something I couldn't watch at home, but I loved it. In an age of slick computer animation, I'm not sure how the movie's puppets will be regarded, but it's a great movie.
• The Tick - This is one of the only series on my list. There are three seasons of The Tick, and I've got them all on VHS. I'll need to buy the DVD collection before my daughter turns seven, because The Tick is possibly the greatest cartoon series ever made. (I'll grant The Simpsons a tie)
• The Black Cauldron - I remember very little about this movie, but I read The Book of Three when I was young and really enjoyed it.
• The Nightmare Before Christmas - I enjoyed Tim Burton's stop-motion masterpiece quite a lot, and I bought the soundtrack on cassette tape. The voice acting is top-notch.
• Space Camp - Another kids' adventure movie. I saw it only once - we rented it from Video Galaxy and watched it on VHS. The fact that I still remember the movie says a lot.
• Elf - Will Ferrell comedies are not generally kids' stuff, but this one is probably just fine. It's been a while since I've seen it - I can see myself busting it out for Christmas 2014.
• Escape from Witch Mountain / Return to Witch Mountain - I absolutely loved these movies when I was a kid. They'd occasionally air for the Disney Sunday Night Movie. Tony and Tia and their magic alien powers take on the grown-ups in an era before Home Alone.
• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - Either before or after watching this, I'm going to have to get Lia started reading the series. I'm wary of beginning too soon though, as I expect she'll remain as voracious a reader as she is now, and the later volumes in the series are probably too much for a seven-year-old.
• The Flight of the Navigator - We had this movie on VHS growing up, and my brothers and I watched in nearly as much as we watched Breathing Fire, which is to say, a lot. As kids, we'd initially thought that Paul Reubens (a.k.a. Pee Wee Herman) voiced the alien spacecraft, but watching the end credits told us that it was "Paul Mall", and the fact that I still remember that name is impressive odd.
• Pete's Dragon - I used to have the Pete's Dragon soundtrack on vinyl. I remember loving the movie. Lia used to watch the scene with Pete and Elliott singing "I love you too" together back when she was 2 years old. I think she'll be ready for the entire movie before she's seven years old.
• The Hobbit - I'm talking about the 1977 version. I still imitate that overzealous vibrato singing "The Greatest Adventure". Yeah - the music was easy to heckle even back then, but it's The Hobbit. It's been so long since I've seen it that I'm not sure whether it'd be too scary, but it's a classic.
• The Incredibles - Lia doesn't have a firm grip on superheroes yet, but that may be largely due to the fact that we don't have traditional television and we've done all we can to shield Lia from any and all portrayals of violence. It's hard to have superheroes without violence, even if it's cartoon violence. But superheroes are such a huge part of geek culture that she'll need to be introduced at some point. I'm sure we could do worse than to start with The Incredibles.
• The Apple Dumpling Gang - I remember liking this Disney comic adventure when I was a kid. It seems like a kid-safe version of Blazing Saddles. As with many things from the seventies, it's got some stereotypes, but with parental guidance, I don't worry about that too much.
• Ernest Goes to Camp - Ernest made a whole bunch of movies. His inane antics remind me a lot of Pee Wee Herman. Stupid, but entertaining. We probably won't go past this first movie, but I remember it fondly so we'll give it a shot.
• Spy Kids - I'm not sure that I've ever seen Spy Kids. But I'm willing to concede that there may exist good kids' adventure movies that were not made in the eighties. There must, right? We'll give this one a try.
• Home Alone - Yeah, I know. My initial reaction is to roll my eyes, and that's probably what you're thinking too. But it's about a kid standing up for himself in creative and funny ways. Lots of violence against adults, so we'll wait a bit before this one gets a viewing in our house.
• James and the Giant Peach - I've never seen the computer-animated version of Roald Dahl's story, but I remember the gist from having read the book 25 or so years ago. Boy meets giant insect, boy ends up trapped inside colossal runaway stone fruit, yadda yadda...
• Bedknobs and Broomsticks - I remember very little about this movie. Something about magic.
• That Darn Cat - This one is a maybe, and as such is at the bottom of my list.