The Don't Make Them Like They Used To

One of my first memories of watching a movie in a theatre was when I was 6 years old. My Dad and I went to see Jumanji. I remember we were late, and this was one of the older theaters where the door was positioned in such a way that when it opened the light from outside blew out the screen.

As I'm writing this, I am watching Jumanji on Netflix instant watch. And it got me to thinking. The style difference between 90s movies and movies today. That goes for all decades. 80s movies are different from 90s. 70s from 80s etc.

The great thing about 90s movies is that they had that sense of adventure. Maybe its because all the movies from the 90s that I remember were targeted towards kids, but they were all fun and put kids in adventurous, fantastical or magical situations that would not be accepted by todays audience.

Take Jumanji. A kid finds a magical board game that sucks him into a jungle where he is stuck for 26 years until two orphaned kids living with their Aunt find the board game and release him. They then try to control the chaos the board game unleashes on their town. When I was a kid, I had dreams that I was stuck in the world of Jumanji.

Then you have movies like The Pagemaster, Indian in the Cupboard, Home Alone, The Mighty Ducks, Sandlot, Free Willy. These movies did something that movies today wouldn't dream of. They put kids in dangerous, life threatening situations. And it was great.

Kids movies today are mostly about talking animals, or teeny-boppers finding love. There are very few kids movies that deal with real life situations, with the exception of Pixar movies. And if there are, they are animated.

Maybe it's because these films give me a feeling of nostalgia. Maybe it's because I'm the only one that feel this way. Maybe I just like bad movies. But I feel very few kids movies have the life long impact on a person that 90s movies had one me when I was a child. I remember scenes from certain movies so vividly that, given all the resources they had in a scene, I could probably recreate it and get very close to what they had in the actual movie. All movies should have that impact. All movies should be that memorable.

Bring back the 90s! Just in movies. Not so much in clothes or music.