Tag: Family

  • State Fair. Dir. Walter Lang. Twentieth Century Fox. 1945.

    “State Fair” is a 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, directed by Walter Lang. The film follows the Frake family, comprised of the farmer Abel (Charles Winninger), his wife Melissa (Fay Bainter), their daughter Margy (Jeanne Crain) and son Wayne (Dick Haymes), on their adventures at the Iowa State Fair.  After making a bet with a…

  • Homeward Bound . Dir. Duwayne Dunham. Disney. 1993.

    In our society and culture, there are many things that affect the relationships and views we have between ourselves and non-human animals; one major aspect being films that focus on animals. Particularly, in Homeward Bound, an adventure film, the fact that the animals were at the center of the film, that they were given human voices…

  • The Great Mouse Detective. Dir. Ron Clements, Burny Mattison, David Michener, and John Musker. Walt Disney. 1986.

    In the world of the animated feature film The Great Mouse Detective (Clements, Mattison, Michener, and Musker, 1986), Victorian-era London contains a society of talking mice that mirrors the city’s human occupants. When one of these mice, Hiram Flaversham, a single father and toy maker, is kidnapped by a peg-legged bat named Fidget, Flaversham’s daughter Olivia, along…

  • Up. Dir. Peter Docter. Disney Pixar. 2009.

    Pixar’s 2009 film Up tells the astonishing tale of Carl, a 78 year old who wishes to fulfil his and his late wife’s dream of reaching Paradise Falls in South America. From meeting as kids, Ellie and Carl dream of being adventurers, and share a passion for the explorer C.F. Muntz and his ‘Spirit of…

  • Hachi: A Dog’s Tale. Dir. Lasse Hallström. Stage 6. 2009.

    As the tale goes Akitas are one of the most loyal and loving breeds of dog in the world. You do not choose an Akita an Akita must choose you. Sent from a monastery in Japan an Akita puppy finds himself alone on a train station platform in America, when his shipping crate falls off…

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird, Jan Pinkava. Disney Pixar. 2007.

    When Remy the rat (Patton Oswalt) discovers his heightened sense of taste and smell, he develops a passion for cooking: sneaking into a human kitchen and watching cookery programmes. However, when his family is lost he travels into Paris and finds a gourmet kitchen, Gusteau’s. With the help of Linguini (Lou Romano), a hapless garbage…

  • Black Beauty. Dir. Carol Thompson. Warner Bros. 1994.

    Good Places, Make Good Horses Black Beauty (1994), directed by Carol Thompson is a film adaption of the 1877 Anna Sewell children’s novel of the same name. The film follows the life of Victorian black stallion Black Beauty and his companions after he leaves his idyllic first home to serve new owners both kind and…

  • The Aristocats. Dir. Wolfgang Reitherman.. Disney. 1970.

    Disney’s The Aristocats[1] follows a family of pet cats who are stolen from the house of Madame Bonfamille, a Parisian aristocrat, when her butler, Edgar, discovers that they will inherit the estate before him. Edgar drugs and abandons the cats in the countryside outside of Paris, presuming that they will be lost forever; however he doesn’t count…

  • War Horse. Dir. Steven Spielberg. DreamWorks. 2011.

    Steven Spielberg’s War Horse (2011) tells the story of teenager Albert Narracott and his horse Joey, tracing their journey from rural Devonshire farm to the Western Front. Joey is the dominant character within the film with the plot line tied directly to his experience rather than Albert’s. Throughout the course of the film Joey encounters…

  • Kung Fu Panda. Dir. John Wayne Stevenson and Mark Osborne. Paramount Pictures. 2008.

    Kung Fu Panda (2008) is a CGI animated family film directed by John Wayne Stevenson and Mark Osborne. Set in a fictional village in ancient China, Shifu the red panda and Kung Fu master is training the Furious Five, a group of particularly skilled fighters, with the hope of one becoming the next ‘Dragon Warrior’: the…