Finding Family Movies

We had a lot of fun over the holidays watching movies, mostly thanks to Jonathan Decker and his book, 250 Great Movies for Latter-day Families. I got the book at the library and used it to pick out a few DVDs that were family friendly. It was quite a relief to be able to find movies we would all enjoy that met our standards. Granted, a lot of the films he recommends are animated and many others are religious films. However, there are plenty of other films I did not know about. It's filled up my "movies to watch" list quite nicely.

We watched, The Big Miracle, a movie about how a group of people in Alaska got together to save some whales. It's probably not the best movie you'll ever see, but we enjoyed it.

We also saw Courageous, a faith-based movie about a group of policemen who come to realize the importance of their role as fathers. It was a very serious movie, sometimes cheesy, and a little preachy at times. (The main characters are Baptist I think.) However, I'm glad we watched it with my sons. There aren't a lot of movies that talk about the role of a good father.

We also saw National Treasure. My younger kids enjoyed it while the rest of us couldn't get past the fictionalization of history. I'm sure you've heard of that one.

Last but not least, we watched The Letter Writer. Actually, I should say I watched The Letter Writer because no one else wanted to see it. (The boys didn't think it looked like their type of movie. It's too bad because it was really good.) It follows the story of a troubled teen who receives an encouraging letter from an old man. The two become friends, and the girl figures out how to fix some of her problems.