<div>"A Bug's Life" (granted, a Disney movie) may as well be acting out the Communist Manifesto-- it's a fun film where the bug-laborers (ants, I think-- it's been several years) unite at the end to expropriate the means of production from the grasshoppers who are living off their labor. </div> <div> </div> <div>Best,</div> <div>Derek</div> <div> </div> <div> </div> <div><br><br> </div> <div><span class="gmail_quote">On 2/11/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Colin Brace</b> <<a href="mailto:cb@lim.nl">cb@lim.nl</a>> wrote:</span> <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">I was talking on the phone yesterday with my sister who lives in<br>Seattle, and we got on the subject of what movies to rent for her <br>kids. She says she draws a blank now whenever she is in the video shop<br>or DVD section of the public library. They've outgrown and/or gotten<br>tired of Disney fare and rented Chitty Chitty Bang Bang too many times <br>already. Ditto The Sound of Music (yuck). The boy is eight, likes to<br>read. The girl is nearly six (she is still in the Disney phase but<br>will probably watch anything her brother watches). Neither of them<br>watch TeeVee, so their imaginations are fresh in many ways. <br><br>So I am trying to put together a list of titles for my sister to look<br>for. As a kid I remembered seeing and enjoying:<br><br>* Ring of Bright Water<br>* Born Free<br>* Wizard of Oz<br>* Le Ballon Rouge<br><br>and of course silent Chaplin and Buster Keaton. <br><br>At some point, my mother (a Canadian with obvious Anglo affinities)<br>took us to see some classic Ealing fare:<br><br>* Lavender Hill Mob<br>* The Ladykillers<br><br>but I can't for the life of me remember how old I was. An eight-year <br>old might have trouble with Cockney accents but how could he not help<br>but fall for Peter Sellers?<br><br>She also took us to see A Hard Day's Night in the middle of winter in<br>that drafty barn the Brattle Theater in Harvard Square (this will <br>surely date me) soon after it came out. Can someone be too young for<br>the Beatles? I don't think so.<br><br>I never saw anything by Jacques Tati as a kid, but am adding this to<br>my list. Obviously the eight-year old will have trouble with <br>subtitles, but Tati's humor is largely visual and he will at least get<br>used to the idea of subtitles. A little later he can watch Traffaut's<br>Wild Child,  which I also enjoyed seeing in my youf.<br><br>Then there is the British classic "Whistle Down the Wind" with Alan <br>Bates, which is about children, but would children also enjoy it?<br><br>OK, all you parents and ex-kids: what can you recommend? Any musical<br>films (not necessary musicals) à la Hard Days Night.? I would<br>especially love some comedy recommendations (Dennis P?)... <br><br>--<br>Colin Brace<br>Amsterdam<br><br>___________________________________<br><a href="http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk">http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk</a></blockquote></div> <br>