[1][2] Children's films come in several major genres like realism, fantasy, adventure, war, musicals, comedy, and literary adaptations.
[4] According to Grodal, films like Finding Nemo (2003), Bambi (1942), or Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away (2001) are based on certain strong emotions like fear, that lead to the activation of what Boyer and Lienard called the hazard-precaution system.
[6] Thus these diverse films deal with certain aspects that are not mere social constructions, but rather emotions relevant to all children and therefore have an appeal to a wider universal audience.
[4] University of Melbourne scholar Timothy Laurie criticises the emphasis placed on children's innate psychic tendencies, noting that "pedagogical norms have been tirelessly heaped onto children's media", and that rather than deriving from hardwired biology, "the quality of childhood is more likely shaped by social policy, political opportunism, pedagogical institutions, and youth-specific market segmentation".
In American family films, the search for a child protagonist involves casting children who meet a specific criterion or standard for physical appearance.
[11] The Walt Disney Company made animated adaptations of Grimms' Fairy Tales before World War II, beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937).
[13] According to Wojcik, the most important film adaptations of children's literature in the immediate post-World War II period were the motion pictures The Diary of Anne Frank by George Stevens (1959), Treasure Island (1950) by Byron Haskin and Luigi Comencini's 1952 motion picture Heidi.
[18][19] Other family/children films of the decade include Pollyanna (1960), Swiss Family Robinson (1960), In Search of the Castaways (1962), The Sword in the Stone (1963), That Darn Cat!
[21] The decade also had live action children's films like Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971), Sounder (1972), Benji (1974), Tuck Everlasting (1976), The Bad News Bears (1976), Freaky Friday (1976), and A Hero Ain't Nothin' but a Sandwich (1978),[21] the divorce drama involving a child Kramer vs. Kramer (1978), and The Muppet Movie (1979).
Also, in the motion picture Empire of the Sun (1987),[25] the protagonist child Jim Graham has to deal with separation from his parents for years, to the point where he is unable to even remember what his mother looked like.
[7] Important animated family films of the 1990s include Disney titles such as Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1994), Mulan (1998), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), and the Pixar animated films Toy Story (1995), its sequel Toy Story 2 (1999), and A Bug's Life (1998).
[31] This decade introduced the modern fairy tale film Edward Scissorhands (1990),[32] depicting an isolated, artificially created young man with human emotions and childlike qualities who is ultimately rejected by society while the female protagonist holds on to his memory.
The 1990s also saw additional live-action family films such as Back to the Future Part III (1990), which brought the Back to the Future franchise into this decade, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990), Home Alone (1990) and its sequel Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992), Hook (1991), Alan & Naomi (1992), Jurassic Park (1993), Steve Zaillian's Searching for Bobby Fischer (1993), Super Mario Bros. (1993), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), The Flintstones (1994), Babe (1995), Jumanji (1995), 101 Dalmatians (1996), Fly Away Home (1996), Vegas Vacation (1997), and October Sky (1999).
Several films were imported from this studio to the United Kingdom including The Magic Fish, The Land of Toys, and The Humpbacked Horse.
Louis Malle made the films Zazie dans le Métro (1960), Murmur of the Heart (1971), and Pretty Baby (1978).
[38] The film making style of Malle and Truffaunt inspired present day directors in making children's films; including Ponette (1996) directed by Jacques Doillon, which deals with the emotional and psychological pain and hurt that children experience "... while living without parental love and care".
[39] Other important European children's cinema in the 1960s include The Christmas Tree (1969), which tells the story of a child coping with his imminent death due to leukemia, and Robert Bresson's film Mouchette (1964), which deals with the suicide of a 14-year-old girl.
According to Wojcik, the contrast between films like Mary Poppins and Mouchette shows the ambiguous or schizoid nature of the depiction of children in the 1960s.
[30] These films include The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962), Lord of the Flies (1963), Born Free (1966), To Sir, with Love (1967) (based on E. R. Braithwaite's real experiences), and if....
[46][47] Pink Floyd The Wall is an unconventional and controversial motion picture that has a haunting and powerful nightmarish depiction of alienated childhood, boarding school separation, maternal deprivation, separation anxiety, war, and consumerist greed that affects a child and further affects his relationships and experiences in adulthood.