Gremlins!

ooh! yes! I must have been very little when I saw that, I thought you could actually go out and buy one

Basicly "All movies I saw when I was younger plus most of the movies I own, and any the child can get his/her mits on when I'm not looking"

I just know I'm going to come downstairs one morning to find my 6 year old watching Day of the Dead or something, and finding it all jolly good fun.

I've seen 8 of them but have only managed to get the kids to watch a few. They now say they're old and want to make up their own minds about what they watch. (Took them all to see Hellboy 2 though!)

They were terrified by Indiana Jones when little, WON'T watch The Dark Crystal, seen all the Star Wars and LOTR, don't like the Time Bandits and love the Japanese films.

I think Gene Wilder's Willie Wonka's pretty geeky, and we all loved ghostbusters and jurassic park. Harry Potter's not geeky any more is it - but they've been watched a number of times anyway. What about ET!? (all loved Gremlins)

PS They all loved Stardust - wonder if it will stand the test of time?

PPS Bill and Ted - is that geeky? I thought it was just for me to watch Keanu and drool!

I wasn't allowed to watch Grange Hill, but I was allowed to watch Jaws with just my dad asking every now and again if i was sure I didn't want to change the channel

Some stuff changes too - like Evil Dead was seen as being a video nasty likely to cause the end of the world or something, but now it's just a bit of fun!

Not that I'd be having the children watch tree-rape...

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PPS Bill and Ted - is that geeky? I thought it was just for me to watch Keanu and drool!

yep! that's another good one!

Every now and then I had to remind myself to watch something first before the kids saw it - just in case - cos you tend to forget an awful lot of stuff they maybe shouldn't see and lump the whole film in your own memory.

Me too Motley. Generally it's hubby that lets Dev watch inappropriate movies, but I've been known to pop in something that Dev just shouldn't see (yet)

He loved Ghostbusters - did he gets all the jokes? Doubtful. But then, neither did I when I watched ancient Looney Tunes and my grandfather would be cackling like a mad scientist and my cousin and I would shrug. The next bit was usually funny.

Toy Story! I can't tell you how many times he's watched that movie! And he loves scary stuff and big explosions. I forgot all about Gremlins, I bet he'd love that flick.

And I thought everyone saw The Last Starfighter - I think I was about 15 when I first saw that and I just loved that movie.

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And I thought everyone saw The Last Starfighter - I think I was about 15 when I first saw that and I just loved that movie.

I've never heard of it! Well, I have now, but I can't look it up at work. What's it about? Has it got ... SPACESHIPS?

I've not seen it, but I know it's about a kid who gets the high score on a shoot 'em up arcade game and therefore qualifies to become a real spaceship fighter in a secret interstellar war. Or something like that.

That's the gist of it, yes. It's good, clean, geeky 80's fun. With some proto-CGI, too.

maybe we should do a geek-movie-watch-along thingy.

ooh,. that sounds awesome, actually. i'd never heard of it either.

I have seen all of them and have a few that weren't on the list... loved them..

The Princess Bride
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Spaceballs
ET
The Last Unicorn
Flight of Dragons


There are a few more that graf could name, but as for myself.. can't think of any..

Labyrinth definately needs to be added to that list.
i don't know if Harry Potter really counts as geeky. LOTR is far more geeky, but rather intense for younger audiences.
how did The Princess Bride not get on the list??? i mean really...
and Willow.
personally i think The Matrix should be introduced early as well, say around 13.
and Bill and Ted is fantastic and kids love it. my little brothers have watched it about 3 million times...

The first Matrix movie only, though, when the idea was fresh and interesting and before they made you think about it to the point where you realized it's kinda dumb.

My kid will be raised on The Goonies, and they better love it or they'll watch it everyday until they love it.

2001: A Space Odyssey will be on permanent repeat.

That's all he wrote.

I didn't see the Goonies until I was at university, so maybe I missed out on the magic...

Camp Nowhere is good, though. It's pretty much exactly how I wanted my life to be when I was a kid, but I don't think I saw it 'til I was about 13

Joseph Campbell must be rolling in his grave.

With Lucas screwing up Star Wars, I really thought that the Matrix was going to take the place of Star Wars as the new modern mythology.
The second movie was... not good, but ultimately might have been salvageable by an awesome finale. Didn't happen. At all.

I've seen all the films on the list.

My list for geeky films for my children:
#1 Princess Bride
#2 Labyrinth (in place of Dark Crystal on the list)
#3 Neverending Story (Then we'll read the book together)
#4 Miyazaki films, My Neighbor Totoro is a good start. (Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke are not for little ones)
#5 Stardust (maybe, I don't know how good it is on repeated viewings yet)

#6 Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi.
#7 Jurassic Park
#8 Explorers (in place of Goonies on the list)
#9 Time Bandits
#10 Back to the Future

Other fantasy:
Willow, Baron Munchausen, The Mummy films including the Scorpion King, Ladyhawke (which I'll understand it s/he doesn't like it), Wizard of Oz, early Disney, Secret of Roan Inish.

Other sci-fi:
Iron Giant, Tron, E.T., many others.

First scary movies:
Ghostbusters, Gremlins.

Hacker/geek movies:
Forget Hackers and War Games, the best hacker movie is the NOVA episode based on Cliff Stoll's book The Cuckoo's Egg. Sneakers is a distant second.

Looking down the list in terms of what I'd show hypothetical children, excluding Dark Crystal, WarGames and Goonies which I've never seen:

Star Wars, yes, any child of mine is being brought up on the original trilogy. My dad broke speed limits so we could see this in the cinema re-release. I would be a bad person to not follow such an example of geekery. No prequels though. No prequels, and no Ribena.

Harry Potter...I actually wouldn't bother showing this to kids. I couldn't stand it as an adaptation.

My Neighbour Totoro I won't need to get for them, first time the Sinking Boy minded them they'd see the entire works of Miysazaki back to back.

Time Bandits I can take or leave, and I'd probably just go straight to Python, really. Get 'em young!

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang I hated as a kid, so probably not.

Back to the Future. The whole trilogy should always be watched out of order, in sections, on multiple channels, over the Christmas holidays. Its one of those rituals of childhood. You have no idea how much better it was in my head before I watched it in a linear fashion.

Would add Mirrormask, Stardust, every Muppet movie except Oz, Gremlins, Indiana Jones...

And any other geeky watching will be supplied by the wall to wall Farscape and Dr Who.