The test for a family film is simple: does anyone leave the room? These pass that test without trying.
The 2000s produced a remarkable run of intelligent, ambitious cinema - a decade that took genre seriously and rewarded patient audiences.
Fantasy cinema at its finest takes the impossible seriously, and finds more truth in it than realism allows.
A poor construction worker, who struggles to keep his son in private school, mistakes an orb he finds in a junkjard for a toy which proves to be much, much more once the young boy starts to play with it.
A young wizard accidentally conjures a spell that puts her family in jeopardy.
With his eye on a lovely aristocrat, a gifted illusionist named Eisenheim uses his powers to win her away from her betrothed, a crown prince. But Eisenheim's scheme creates tumult within the monarchy and ignites the suspicion of a dogged inspector.
Spain, 1939. In the last days of the Spanish Civil War, the young Carlos arrives at the Santa Lucía orphanage, where he will make friends and enemies as he follows the quiet footsteps of a mysterious presence eager for revenge.
In a countryside town bordering on a magical land, a young man makes a promise to his beloved that he'll retrieve a fallen star by venturing into the magical realm. His journey takes him into a world beyond his wildest dreams and reveals his true identity.
The fantasy films that endure are the ones rooted in genuine emotion. The magic is the vehicle; the story is always about something human.
Harold Crick is a lonely IRS agent whose mundane existence is transformed when he hears a mysterious voice narrating his life.
After losing Captain Jack Sparrow to the locker of Davy Jones, Will Turner, Elizabeth Swann, and Captain Barbossa journey to the ends of the earth to rescue him. And as the East India Trading Company tightens its grip on the seas under Lord Cutler Beckett-now in control of Davy Jones-the fate of piracy hangs by a thread. Now, they must unite the pirate lords for one final stand. But as loyalties are tested and alliances shift, each must ultimately choose where they stand in the battle for freedom on the high seas.
Stowing away after a failed con, a pair of swindlers end up on El Dorado, the fabled "city of gold", where they quickly get in over their heads when they are mistaken as gods by the inhabitants.
A ghost and a French marquis wander through the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, encountering scenes from many different periods of its history.
A waitress, desperate to fulfill her dreams as a restaurant owner, is set on a journey to turn a frog prince back into a human being, but she has to face the same problem after she kisses him.
The best hopeful films aren't naive. They acknowledge the difficulty and find the humanity anyway. These do that.
A great fantasy film leaves you with that rare ache - a longing to return to a world that never existed.