Some DVD reviews.

These past school holidays we did a fair amount of DVD watching! 
We had our adventure in Oudtshoorn, a wonderful week at Holiday Club - Wild West Style, bike-riding, rollerblading, a visit to the forest, board games and books etc. but we also spent many hours bundled under blankets, with warm beanbags to fend off the cold, watching DVD's -old and new.
I find it quite hard at times to find DVD's that will appeal to both my children as, with a four and a half year age gap, they are at very different places. 
Already Niave is allowed to watch and has been allowed to watch movies that Abigail wouldn't have watched at the same age. Nothing major but things like How To Train Your Dragon (one of our favourites!) with it's PG rating would not have been on the list when Abigail was 4 - 5 years old, but Niave got there much earlier!
Now with Abigail turning 11 in a couple of months time she is entering a new phase in many arena's, not a phase I'm altogether happy with (!!) but a phase nonetheless! Pre-Teen - Yikes!!


Reading the back of a DVD does not often help me in knowing whether or not it will be suitable as "the world" does not necessarily review movies with the same values as I do!
Strangely enough, it's often the movies that get a bad rap in the media that end up being the nicest - not always, but often!!
A website that I have found enormously helpful in reviewing movies is Plugged-in, an offshoot of Focus on the Family.


Some of our favourites from our own DVD cupboard include Tangled, Annie, Rio, Velveteen Rabbit, Joseph, The Toy Story and Shrek Trilogies and Cars to name but a few!
Here I would like to review some of these and some others so as to be a help to others out there, because maybe you, like me, have the same trouble sometimes...

Tangled made a comeback in our lounge this holiday, we watched it back to back I don't know how many times!! 
And we were delighted to find a sequel "short" movie of the wedding online!
I love the charcaters in this movie and the soundtrack too, the storyline has a little more depth than the old Disney Princess movies.
If you haven't seen it, make sure it's on your list next time!

Annie is also one of our all-time favourites, we revisit it regularly!
There are a couple of versions of this well-loved musical about an orphan in New York in the 1920's - 30's, we (I!) definitely prefer the 1999 Disney version with Kathy Bates as Miss Hannigan. I find Carrol Burnette a bit too "drunk" in the previous one made in the '80's and that scene with them all climbing up a long ladder to who know's where freaked me out forever! This one is a lot more friendly while still maintaining the Annie magic and all the songs etc.

We also hired a couple of DVD's over the holidays, one was Dolphin Tale, the true story of Winter, a dolphin who loses her tail after getting caught in a rope/net. This story held many parallels for us with a strong theme of (dis)ability running through it.
This may be one that we'll have to add to our cupboard!

Mr. Magoriums Wonder Emporium with Dustin Hoffman is one that I always steered clear of for some reason, but this time I decided to take a chance, boy was I surprised! Such a lovely movie. I loved the characters in it and it's simplicity as well as it's wonder.
Niave didn't enjoy it as much as Abigail did, so probably more for slightly older children, about 8 -11 or 12 year olds.

On Saturday night we had a family movie night, I hired 2 movies that none of us had ever seen (quite hard to find!) the first one was We Bought a Zoo with Matt Damon.
This movie irritated me because while it had a sweet story (also based on real events) and was clearly aimed at children or families, it contained a couple of swear words and the sweet little girl Rosie was spoilt for me when towards the end she has a line that had Niave asking me "Mommy, what does 'dick' mean?" I feel that all of that could have been left out without taking away, if not adding to the appeal of the movie. So, be warned, this one may not be what you are looking for on family movie night!

Also on Saturday (it was a late night!) we watched Soul Surfer, the true story of Bethany Hamilton who at the age of 13 was attacked by a shark and lost her arm.
This is one we will definitely own! No bad language, and we all loved it. 
A truly inspirational story that will appeal to young and old.


Maybe it's just me, maybe nobody really cares about age restrictions or parental guidance, but I do, and sometimes I wish there was someone out there giving me advice about this! So I'm giving it to you instead!!
Happy watching!
{I have no idea what these white patches all over this post are nor how to get rid of them, sorry, most annoying!}