Halloween Films the Whole Family Can Enjoy

Halloween is inching closer and many children are begging to watch scary movies to celebrate. Here are ten of my favorite child-friendly Halloween themed (or Halloween appropriate) films and what age groups they are appropriate for. Most of the Halloween movies listed are not too scary or mature for younger children to watch, and any movies only appropriate for older children will be marked as such.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #10: Casper (1995). Ages 7+ This live-action film features a young Christina Ricci as Kat, the daughter of afterlife therapist Dr. James Harvey (Bill Pullman). When Dr. Harvey is asked by a greedy woman seeking treasure to spend time in a haunted house, his daughter Kat soon befriends Casper, the one friendly ghost out of the four haunting the place. Casper's uncles (Stinkie, Stretch, and Fatso) are not so friendly. Dr. Harvey must befriend the ghosts and find a way to rid the house of them for his client. Mild violence, mostly of the cartoon variety (a man's head twists backwards, a woman tries to kill a man with an ax and then again by running him over with her car, etc.) is featured in this film. There are a few mild obscenities. The movie might scare smaller children but delivers a positive message.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #9: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1949). Ages 5+ This cartoon based on Washington Irving's classic American horror story Sleepy Hollow was originally packaged with The Adventures of Mr. Toad but can now be bought alone. The story focuses on Ichabod Crane, an awkward schoolmaster who is new to the town of Sleepy Hollow and frequently ridiculed by the town bully Brom Jones. When Crane becomes infatuated with the most beautiful girl in town, Katrina Van Tassel, Brom makes many efforts to rid himself of Ichabod. Soon Brom's trickery leads to an encounter with the headless horseman himself. This movie features mild violence.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #8: Monsters, Inc. (2001). Ages 5+ This animated feature depicts a town inhabited by monsters. The town gets its energy from screams, so it is the job of many monsters to scare children so that the town can continue to thrive. When a human child (Boo) follows the good-hearted James P. Sullivan (Sully) into the monster world, their whole world is turned upside down. Monsters believe that the touch of a child is poisonous. Sully and his friend Mike Wazowski learn that Boo is absolutely harmless, but returning her to her room proves to be a problem. The movie has mild violence (a monster sits on some jacks, a girl is seen wriggling in a "scream extraction" machine) and scenes that may scare smaller children, but the message is, as with Casper, a positive one.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #7: Corpse Bride (2005). Ages 7+ Corpse Bride is a stop-motion animated film set in the 19^th century about a man (Victor) who is betrothed to a woman he does not know (Victoria) through an arranged marriage. Victoria's aristocratic parents are poor and seek Victor's family's fortune, and they are merely wealthy commoners and want to marry Victor into a family of elevated status. When the awkward Victor finds himself incapable of reciting his marriage vows properly, he goes to a forest to practice and finds himself betrothed to a corpse (Emily) as soon as he gets the vows right. He must try and find his way back before Victoria is wed to another man. There is mild violence in this film (a man is poisoned), but mostly it is cartoon violence. Smaller children might be frightened by the characters in the film (many are skeletons or corpses that appear to be rotting; one man is able to split himself in half, a head walks about on its own, an eye pops out of a socket repeatedly, and so on). There are a couple of mild profanities.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #6: The Black Cauldron (1986). Ages 6+ In this animated feature, a young pigkeeper named Taran must go on a quest to save a magical oracular pig (Hen Wen) when the pig is kidnapped by an evil lord (The Horned King). The Horned King believes that Hen Wen will lead him to the Black Cauldron, which would give him the power to create an army of invincible soldiers. Taran teams up with Princess Eilonwy, a bard named Fflewddur Fflam, and a pesky but loyal creature called Gurgi to save Hen Wen. The Black Cauldron has mild violence (the soldiers, someone dies and comes back to life, the main character faces death many times) and many scenes may scare small children (skeletons and creatures of all sorts appear throughout the film).

Child appropriate Halloween movie #5: Beetlejuice (1988). Ages 8+ This live-action film focuses on Barbara (Geena Davis) and Adam (Alec Baldwin) Maitland, who have just died and are coping with their afterlives as ghosts. When an obnoxious family moves into their house, they hire bio-exorcist Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton) to drive them out, but he causes more problems than he solves when Lydia Deetz (Winona Ryder), the youngest member of the new inhabitants (and the only member the Maitlands like), is disturbed. Beetlejuice features mild profanities (Beetlejuice is also quite inappropriate and in one instance the word "fuck" is used) and mild violence (many corpses are featured briefly, including one woman who has been cut in half, a woman whose throat has been slit, another who slit her wrists, etc.). Sexual references are few, but at one point Beetlejuice visits a strip club labeled "Dante's Inferno Room" with scantily clad corpse-women outside. The film will probably scare small children.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #4: The Addams Family (1991). Ages 8+ The Addams Family is a live-action film starring Raúl Juliá as Gomez Addams and Anjelica Huston as Morticia Addams. The story revolves around the macabre Addams family and the con artist who is posing as their Uncle Fester, who the family has not seen in twenty-five years. Gomez and Morticia's daughter Wednesday suspects that Fester is an imposter. The Addams Family features mild violence and implied violence (Wednesday puts her brother Pugsley [Jimmy Workman] in an electric chair, a severed hand crawls around on its own, etc.). There are sexual references (a public orgasm, much implication, and some references to sadomasochism), but all in all the references will likely go over most children's heads. There is very little profanity. The film (rated PG-13, but younger children may be able to tolerate it) may scare small children.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #3: Coraline (2009). Ages 8+ Coraline is a stop-motion animated film about a bored young girl who finds a passage to an alternate world in which everyone she knows is present - except that they have buttons for eyes and are strangely kind. At first it seems great, but Coraline realizes soon that there are secrets the other world holds. The only sexual reference included in the film is during a scene in which two scantily clad older women act out a play (one member of the audience exclaims that one of them is "practically naked!"). There are many creepy scenes, and little true violence, though it is implied that three children have died and the main character may share the same fate. The theme is very dark and is likely to scare small children.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #2: The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993). Ages 6+The Nightmare Before Christmasis a stop-motion animated movie in which the Pumpkin King of Halloween Town (Jack Skellington) discovers Christmas Town and decides he loves it so much that he wants to have the residents of Halloween Town celebrate Christmas. But when they try, they find that everything turns out just a bit creepier than in Christmas Town. There is a little mild violence in The Nightmare Before Christmas (a man has a hatchet buried in his head, but there is no blood or other indication that it is there; Santa Claus is kidnapped by a villain; Jack falls from the sky to the ground, etc.), but no other major issues. The film may scare some small children. Much like Coraline (but perhaps not quite as frightening), this film is about how the grass is not always greener on the other side.

Child appropriate Halloween movie #2: It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966). Ages 3+ This classic animated film featuring the characters from Charles Schulz's beloved Peanuts characters is one Halloween film the whole family can watch. The story is very basic: the Peanuts gang celebrates Halloween while Linus waits for the legendary Great Pumpkin. There is only very mild violence in the film (Snoopy pretends to be a World War II flying ace), and children dressed in costumes is about as scary as it gets. The whole family can enjoy this Halloween classic without any worries.

While some of these Halloween movies are scarier or more violent than others, most children over the age of nine will be able to watch anything off of the list. Other movies that could be enjoyed for Halloween are The Wizard of Oz (appropriate for most ages) and the Harry Potter series (which starts out as appropriate for ages 6+, but by the fifth film it may only be appropriate for children over 10 or so).

Sources:
Common Sense Media
IMDb
Kids in Mind