AnimeUnity: family fantasy films from 1951 to today, from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, The Love Bug and Time Bandits to Return to Oz, The Secret Garden, Narnia and Matilda the Musical, and where to watch them

How AnimeUnity looks

AnimeUnity takes its look from the deep blue anime streaming site whose name it shares. The page sits on a dark navy background, and a fixed navigation bar runs across the top in an even darker shade, with the AnimeUnity star on the left and short labels underneath small white icons: Home, Archive, Christmas, Storybooks, Top and My List. Each label glows a bright sky blue when you point at it, and the search field waits on the right of the bar.

Beneath the bar, a wide slideshow shows a handful of featured films in full colour, each with a bold title and its year and running time across the bottom. A slim blue notice bar follows, and then the page divides into two columns. On the left, a navy panel headed Latest additions in bold capitals holds a grid of posters, each with its title printed on a dark band along the bottom edge, and a pair of numbered buttons lets you turn to a second page of recent films. Further panels show the storybook, Christmas, witches and creatures shelves in the same style.

On the right, a narrower column lists recently released films with a small cover, a blue title and three short lines of detail: the year, the genres and the running time. Below it, the shelves are gathered as small buttons, so you can jump straight to fairy tales, the 1980s or the stage musicals. The footer is the darkest part of the page, with the help links, a copyright line and a pair of small theme tiles marked with the letter A, borrowed from the original site's theme switch.

Every film page follows the same calm pattern: a large poster, the title and year, the running time and genres, the story in a few sentences, the cast and studio, and the Watch now button with a country menu beside it. Everything is designed to be read comfortably on a phone held in one hand or on a large television screen across the room.

Finding your way around

There are several ways into the catalogue, and each one suits a different mood. The search field in the navigation bar is the quickest: type part of a title, a character or a creature, such as Herbie, Narnia, unicorn, Sinbad or Santa, and the matching films appear as you type. The search understands partial words, so Witch finds Witch Mountain, The Good Witch and every film with a witch in its title.

The Archive link in the bar opens every film on a single page, sorted with the most popular first, and the A to Z list lets you browse alphabetically from The 3 Worlds of Gulliver to Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 4. The shelves are the best way to explore by theme or by decade; each one opens as a grid of posters with a short introduction at the top. The Top link leads to the highest-rated films, a good place to start if you are looking for a crowd pleaser.

My List keeps track of the films you would like to watch. Press the save button on any film page and it appears in My List, which stays in this browser and opens instantly. You can export the list to a small file and import it on a second device, so the film night you plan on a laptop can be ready on the family tablet. The guides, linked from the footer and from the bottom of this page, collect the best films for each theme with a few lines about why they are worth watching.

The fifties: angels, giants and a piano lesson

The oldest film on AnimeUnity is Angels in the Outfield from 1951, in which a team of heavenly helpers lends a hand to a struggling Pittsburgh baseball club and a gruff manager learns to mind his language. It sets the tone for much of the catalogue: an everyday setting, a touch of the miraculous and a warm heart. Two years later came The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T., written by Dr. Seuss himself, a dreamlike musical in which a boy who would rather play outside than practise the piano imagines a gigantic keyboard built for five hundred children at once.

The later fifties brought colour and spectacle. Around the World in 80 Days sent David Niven around the globe by balloon, train and elephant, and Tom Thumb, produced by George Pal, shrank Russ Tamblyn to the size of a thumb and set him dancing among toys. The 7th Voyage of Sinbad introduced audiences to the stop-motion magic of Ray Harryhausen, with a cyclops, a dragon and a sword-fighting skeleton, and Journey to the Center of the Earth followed James Mason and Pat Boone down an Icelandic volcano into a glowing underground world.

The decade closes with one of Disney's most beloved live-action fantasies, Darby O'Gill and the Little People, in which an Irish storyteller outwits the king of the leprechauns and a young Sean Connery sings a love song. There is also Perri, a Disney nature fantasy about a squirrel in the forest, and a 1955 television Alice in Wonderland from the early days of the small screen. Together these films show that the ingredients of family fantasy were in place long before computer effects arrived: a good story, a sense of wonder and a craftsman who loves the work.

The sixties: musicals, myths and Harryhausen

The 1960s were a golden decade for big-screen family fantasy, and the catalogue holds many of its finest moments. Ray Harryhausen continued his magical run with The 3 Worlds of Gulliver, in which Kerwin Mathews visits Lilliput and Brobdingnag, and Jason and the Argonauts, whose army of skeletons and towering bronze giant Talos remain among the most admired sequences in fantasy cinema. Jack the Giant Killer borrowed the same star and the same spirit, and The Magic Sword sent a young knight on a quest to rescue a princess.

George Pal returned with The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm, which mixed the lives of the famous storytellers with three of their tales, and Disney made a lavish Babes in Toyland with Annette Funicello and Ray Bolger. Snow White and the Three Stooges gave the fairy tale to the famous comedy trio and to figure skater Carol Heiss, and Munster, Go Home! took the friendliest monster family in television on a trip to an English country house.

The end of the decade brought two of the grandest family musicals ever made. Doctor Dolittle starred Rex Harrison as the doctor who learns to talk to the animals, with a two-headed llama and a giant pink sea snail, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang turned Ian Fleming's story of a magical car into a riot of songs, inventions, candy factories and a flight over the white cliffs of Dover, with Dick Van Dyke as the inventor Caractacus Potts. Finian's Rainbow brought Fred Astaire and Petula Clark together with a leprechaun chasing his stolen pot of gold, and The Love Bug introduced Herbie, the little white racing car with a number 53 on his bonnet and a will of his own.

The sixties shelf also has some smaller treasures for the curious: Magic Christmas Tree, Fun in Balloon Land, Hey Cinderella! from Jim Henson's early years, The Gnome-Mobile with Walter Brennan driving a vintage Rolls-Royce into a forest of gnomes, and Blackbeard's Ghost, in which Peter Ustinov plays a pirate who must do one good deed to leave his old inn.

The seventies: Britain, Disney and a land of Oz

Seventies family fantasy has a texture all its own: rich colours, painted skies and actors who seem to be enjoying themselves enormously. British studios led the way with Scrooge, the musical Christmas Carol in which Albert Finney sings Thank You Very Much, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, with Fiona Fullerton as Alice and a remarkable cast of comic actors as the creatures she meets. The Amazing Mr. Blunden is a gentle ghost story about two children who travel back in time to help, and Tales of Beatrix Potter has dancers of the Royal Ballet in masks of Peter Rabbit, Jemima Puddle-Duck and Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle.

Disney kept the Herbie engine running with Herbie Rides Again, in which Helen Hayes and the little car fight to save her firehouse home, and added The Island at the Top of the World, a Victorian airship voyage to a hidden Arctic valley, and Escape to Witch Mountain, the story of Tony and Tia, two orphans with extraordinary gifts. Its sequel, Return from Witch Mountain, brought Bette Davis and Christopher Lee into the story. Charley and the Angel gave Fred MacMurray a kindly guardian angel and a second look at his busy family, and Freaky Friday, with Jodie Foster and Barbara Harris, set the template for every body swap comedy that followed.

The decade also brought The Wiz, the soulful New York retelling of Oz with Diana Ross as Dorothy and Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow, and two films made in an unusual spirit of cooperation: The Little Prince, with Gene Wilder as the fox and songs by Lerner and Loewe, and The Blue Bird, a fable with Elizabeth Taylor that was filmed in Leningrad. Pufnstuf brought the psychedelic puppet island of the television series to the big screen, and Arabian Adventure closed the decade with flying carpets, a genie and Christopher Lee as a wicked caliph.

The eighties: Cannon tales, Ewoks and Bigfoot

The 1980s shelf holds 51 films and has a wonderfully varied character. Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits sent a boy named Kevin tumbling through history with a band of time-travelling adventurers and a stolen map of the holes in creation, meeting Napoleon, Robin Hood and King Agamemnon along the way. It is a clever, funny and sometimes eerie film, best for children of ten and over. Return to Oz brought Dorothy back to a ruined Emerald City with a talking hen, a mechanical man called Tik-Tok and Jack Pumpkinhead, and it remains one of the most imaginative visits to Oz ever filmed.

Lucasfilm made two television films set on the forest moon of Endor, The Ewok Adventure and Ewoks: The Battle for Endor, in which a little girl named Cindel and the brave Ewok Wicket set off on adventures among the giant trees. Santa Claus: The Movie gave Dudley Moore the role of an inventive elf who leaves the North Pole for New York, and One Magic Christmas sent a guardian angel to remind a tired mother of the joy of the season. Harry and the Hendersons made Bigfoot a member of a Seattle family, with makeup by Rick Baker that won an Academy Award.

Cannon Films produced a series of fairy tale musicals in the late eighties, and many of them are here: Snow White with Diana Rigg as the queen, Sleeping Beauty, Puss in Boots with Christopher Walken as a dancing cat, Hansel and Gretel with Cloris Leachman, The Frog Prince and Rumpelstiltskin with Amy Irving. They have a charming handmade quality, with castles, forests and village squares built on the stages of Israeli studios.

The decade also brought Nutcracker: The Motion Picture, filmed with the Pacific Northwest Ballet and designed by Maurice Sendak, The Boy Who Could Fly, a tender story about a lonely teenager and the boy next door who dreams of flight, Mio in the Land of Faraway from Astrid Lindgren's novel, with a young Christian Bale, and The New Adventures of Pippi Longstocking. From Canada came The Peanut Butter Solution, Tommy Tricker and the Stamp Traveller and The Great Land of Small, three of Rock Demers' much-loved Tales for All, and from Disney came The Return of the Shaggy Dog and Bigfoot.

The nineties: television fairy tales and home video favourites

The 1990s are the largest decade on AnimeUnity, with 110 films, and they reflect a time when cable channels and video shops were hungry for family entertainment. The big-screen highlights include The Secret Garden, produced by Francis Ford Coppola's studio with Maggie Smith as the housekeeper, and A Little Princess, Alfonso Cuarón's glowing adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett's other great novel. The Secret of Roan Inish tells an Irish legend of seal people on a windswept island, and Into the West follows two boys and a white horse across Ireland.

Comedy and fantasy blended happily. The Flintstones brought Bedrock to life with John Goodman as Fred, Kazaam gave Shaquille O'Neal a genie's lamp, A Simple Wish cast Martin Short as a fairy godfather still learning his craft and Bogus gave a young Haley Joel Osment an imaginary friend played by Gérard Depardieu. Angels in the Outfield remade the 1951 classic with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Christopher Lloyd as the head angel, and Mighty Joe Young brought a giant gorilla from Africa to Los Angeles with Charlize Theron as his protector.

Television gave the decade its greatest number of fantasy films. Cinderella, with Brandy as Cinderella and Whitney Houston as the fairy godmother, is a joyful production of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. Merlin cast Sam Neill as the wizard, Alice in Wonderland gathered an enormous comic cast around Tina Majorino, and The Canterville Ghost paired Patrick Stewart with a lively American family. Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Sabrina Goes to Rome gave Melissa Joan Hart her famous role, and Mrs. Santa Claus let Angela Lansbury sing her way through the New York of 1910.

The decade's home video shelf is a treasure trove of fun: A Kid in King Arthur's Court, Magic in the Water with its shy lake creature, The Adventures of Pinocchio with Martin Landau as Geppetto, The Wind in the Willows made by members of the Monty Python team, FairyTale: A True Story about the Cottingley fairy photographs, and The Borrowers, in which John Goodman chases a family of tiny people through a house built on a giant scale.

The 2000s: books, wishes and bedtime stories

The 93 films of the 2000s are dominated by adaptations of popular children's books and by big studio comedies with a magical twist. Peter Pan from 2003, with Jeremy Sumpter as Peter and Jason Isaacs as both Mr. Darling and Captain Hook, is one of the most faithful and beautiful versions of J. M. Barrie's story. Five Children and It followed a sand fairy who grants a wish each day, Tuck Everlasting told the story of a family who drank from a magic spring, and Charlotte's Web brought a spider, a pig and a barnful of talking animals to life.

Cornelia Funke's novels became The Thief Lord, set among the canals of Venice, and Inkheart, in which Brendan Fraser plays a father who can read characters out of books. City of Ember followed Saoirse Ronan through an underground city whose lights are failing, Nim's Island put Abigail Breslin on a tropical island with a sea lion and an iguana, and The Water Horse imagined the childhood of the Loch Ness monster.

Comedies with a magical idea were everywhere. Bedtime Stories showed Adam Sandler's bedtime tales coming true the next day, Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium gave Dustin Hoffman a toy shop with a life of its own, Imagine That gave Eddie Murphy a daughter whose imaginary friends seem to give excellent business advice, and Shorts followed a rainbow-coloured wishing rock around a suburban town. Like Mike gave a young basketball fan a pair of magic sneakers, and Where the Wild Things Are turned Maurice Sendak's picture book into a moving film about a boy and his feelings. Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie sent Selena Gomez and her family to the Caribbean in search of a magic stone, and Herbie Fully Loaded gave the famous car a new driver in Lindsay Lohan.

The 2010s: Disney Channel magic and grand adventures

The 95 films of the 2010s include a wave of Disney Channel original films, a handful of ambitious studio fantasies and a great many charming smaller productions. 16 Wishes gave Debby Ryan a box of birthday candles that grant one wish each, Avalon High imagined King Arthur and his court reborn in an American high school, and Teen Beach Movie sent two surfers into the world of a sixties beach musical, followed by Teen Beach 2, in which the musical's characters visit the real world.

On the big screen, Gulliver's Travels gave Jack Black the run of Lilliput, The Odd Life of Timothy Green told of a boy who grows from a garden bed with leaves on his ankles, and Pan imagined the story before Peter Pan, with Hugh Jackman as a flamboyant Blackbeard and Levi Miller as the orphan who learns to fly. Christopher Robin brought Winnie the Pooh and his friends from the Hundred Acre Wood to London to help their grown-up friend, and The Kid Who Would Be King found the sword in the stone on a London building site, with Patrick Stewart as Merlin.

The decade also holds Tooth Fairy, in which Dwayne Johnson must serve as a tooth fairy, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters, Peter Pan Live! with Allison Williams and Christopher Walken, the Royal Ballet's colourful Royal Opera House: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away, in which a young woman falls into a dreamlike world of acrobats. Smaller treasures include The Christmas Dragon, Molly Moon and the Incredible Book of Hypnotism and Ruby Strangelove Young Witch.

2020 to today: new classics in the making

The newest shelf holds 68 films, and it shows family fantasy in fine health. The Secret Garden from 2020 painted Misselthwaite's garden in vivid, almost magical colour, Four Kids and It sent four children on a beach holiday with a grumpy sand fairy and Upside-Down Magic followed a group of young wizards whose powers work in unexpected ways. Flora & Ulysses has a heroic squirrel who can type poetry, and Magic Camp sends a struggling magician back to the summer camp of his youth.

Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical brought the hit stage show to the screen with Alisha Weir as Matilda and Emma Thompson as the terrifying headmistress Miss Trunchbull, and Disenchanted returned Amy Adams to the role of Giselle, the cartoon princess living in the suburbs. Peter Pan & Wendy reimagined Neverland with Jude Law as Hook, Slumberland sent Jason Momoa wandering through dreams, and IF, written and directed by John Krasinski, followed a girl who can see everyone's imaginary friends, especially the ones who have been forgotten.

The most recent arrivals include Harold and the Purple Crayon, in which Harold draws himself out of his book and into the real world, Descendants: The Rise of Red, with the daughter of the Queen of Hearts travelling back in time, The Legend of Ochi, a handmade fable about a girl and a lost baby creature in the mountains, Sketch, in which a girl's drawings come to life, Momo, a new film of Michael Ende's novel about the time thieves, and The Magic Faraway Tree, a new film of Enid Blyton's story about a family who discover a tree with new worlds at the top of its branches.

Storybook classics

The storybook shelf is the heart of AnimeUnity, with 80 films adapted from children's literature. The great Victorian and Edwardian stories appear in many versions. Peter Pan appears in five: the 2003 film, Pan, Peter & Wendy from British television, Peter Pan Live! and Peter Pan & Wendy. Alice has eight films, including Jonathan Miller's black and white television version, and The Secret Garden has three, from 1993, 2017 and 2020.

Some stories travel to Narnia. The BBC's three-part adaptation of C. S. Lewis's books in the late eighties is collected as The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian & The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair, beloved by a generation of British children. Others travel to Oz: Return to Oz, The Wiz, The Wonderful Land of Oz and The Dreamer of Oz, a television biography of L. Frank Baum that imagines how he came to write the books.

Edith Nesbit's stories appear in Five Children and It, Four Kids and It and The Phoenix and the Magic Carpet, Mary Norton's in three versions of The Borrowers, and Philippa Pearce's in Tom's Midnight Garden, in which a boy discovers a garden from the past each night when the clock strikes thirteen. More recent books include Cornelia Funke's novels, City of Ember, Nim's Island, Flora & Ulysses, Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made and Harold and the Purple Crayon.

Read the Storybook classics guide for a tour of the shelf, and open the full shelf for every adaptation sorted by popularity.

Fairy tales

The fairy tale shelf gathers 47 films built on the stories that the Brothers Grimm, Charles Perrault and Hans Christian Andersen collected and polished centuries ago. Cinderella appears in many guises: Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical Cinderella, Jim Henson's playful Hey Cinderella!, and the modern retellings Elle: A Modern Cinderella Tale and A Cinderella Story: If the Shoe Fits, in which the glass slipper becomes a record deal or a song contest.

Pinocchio has five films, from the 1976 television musical Pinocchio, with Danny Kaye as Geppetto, to Martin Landau's warm Geppetto in The Adventures of Pinocchio and its sequel, and the television musical Geppetto, which tells the story from the point of view of the old woodcarver, with Drew Carey in the title role. Jack climbs the beanstalk in Jack and the Beanstalk and Beanstalk, and the Snow Queen sweeps across the ice in Snow Queen and The Snow Queen.

The Nutcracker is a seasonal favourite, with four films: the 1986 ballet film, a 1993 version with the New York City Ballet, an imaginative 2010 film and The Secret of the Nutcracker. Aladdin rubs his lamp in Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp and Aladdin, and Hansel and Gretel follow the breadcrumbs in two films, including the clever modern sequel Hansel & Gretel: After Ever After. For those who like a twist, A Fairy Tale After All sends a headstrong teenager into a storybook world full of whimsical characters during a school marionette show.

Many of these films were made for television or home video and are short enough for an early evening, which makes them ideal for younger children. The Fairy tales guide picks out the best of them.

Christmas magic

Christmas magic is the largest shelf on AnimeUnity, with 127 films, and it could fill every evening from the first of December to the New Year. Santa Claus himself appears in dozens of guises. Santa Claus: The Movie tells the story of how a kindly woodcutter became Father Christmas, Mrs. Santa Claus lets his wife take the sleigh for a spin, Meet The Santas and Single Santa Seeks Mrs. Claus marry off Santa's son, and in Becoming Santa a young man discovers that his girlfriend's parents run the North Pole.

Reindeer, dragons and unicorns join the celebrations. Prancer follows a farm girl who nurses an injured reindeer back to health in the belief that it belongs to Santa, and its new companion Prancer: A Christmas Tale continues the tradition. The Christmas Dragon and A Unicorn for Christmas add fantastical creatures to the snow, and Elmo's Christmas Countdown, Sesame Street: Elmo Saves Christmas and Once Upon a Sesame Street Christmas bring Sesame Street to the holidays.

Several films borrow from Charles Dickens. Scrooge is the grand musical version, An American Christmas Carol moves the story to New England in the Depression, with Henry Winkler as a stingy businessman, and A Sesame Street Christmas Carol, A Carol Christmas and It's Christmas, Carol! play with the old tale in different ways. Others are time loop comedies: Christmas...Again?!, Christmas Do-Over and 12 Days of Christmas Eve all ask what you would do if you could live the holiday again until you got it right.

The Christmas magic guide picks a few favourites, and the full shelf is sorted by popularity so the best-loved films come first.

Witches and wizards

The Witches and wizards shelf holds 123 films, and it covers every kind of magic: spells, wishes, genies, enchanted objects and the gift of seeing things others miss. The Good Witch series follows Cassie Nightingale, the gentle owner of a shop of curiosities in a small town, through The Good Witch, The Good Witch's Garden, The Good Witch's Gift, The Good Witch's Family, The Good Witch's Charm, The Good Witch's Destiny and The Good Witch's Wonder.

Young wizards learn their trade in Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie, The Wizards Return: Alex vs. Alex, Upside-Down Magic, Magic Camp and Johnny Mysto: Boy Wizard, and Melissa Joan Hart plays the teenager who discovers her powers on her sixteenth birthday in Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Genies grant wishes in Kazaam and A Kid in Aladdin's Palace, and fairy godparents get to work in A Simple Wish, A Fairly Odd Movie: Grow Up, Timmy Turner! and A Fairly Odd Summer.

Some of the best films on the shelf are about wishes. 16 Wishes lets a girl's birthday wishes come true one after another, Bedtime Stories makes the stories true, and Wish Upon a Unicorn sends a brother and sister on a hunt for a magical creature. The shelf is also home to the legendary sorcerers: Merlin with Sam Neill, Merlin: The Return, The Sorcerer's Apprentice and The Kid Who Would Be King.

For a tour of the magic shelf, read the Witches and wizards guide.

Creatures and monsters

The creatures shelf gathers 92 films about dragons, unicorns, dinosaurs, sea monsters, gnomes, leprechauns and the friendliest monsters in cinema. Many of them follow the same lovely pattern: a lonely child finds a creature the grown-ups find hard to believe in, and the two of them must keep each other safe. The Water Horse, Magic in the Water and Mee-Shee: The Water Giant all find a shy creature in a lake, and Harry and the Hendersons, Bigfoot and The Wildman of Shaggy Creek meet the great hairy giant of the American forests.

The little people of folklore have a corner of their own. Darby O'Gill and the Little People is the classic, The Last Leprechaun, Leapin' Leprechauns and A Very Unlucky Leprechaun continue the Irish tradition, and The Gnome-Mobile takes a pair of children deep into a redwood forest to find a wife for a lonely young gnome. Dinosaurs return in Adventures in Dinosaur City, My Pet Dinosaur, Prehysteria! and Timescape: Back to the Dinosaurs, and the Dinotopia miniseries, starting with Discovering Dinotopia, imagines an island where people and dinosaurs live together in peace.

The friendly monsters are perhaps the most fun. Little Monsters sends Fred Savage under his bed into a world of monsters who scare children at night, Munchie and Munchie Strikes Back each give a lonely boy a wisecracking little creature with magical powers, My Pet Monster and Fuzzbucket are gentle tales for younger viewers, and The Legend of Ochi introduces a whole species of shy, bright-eyed mountain creatures, made with puppets and painted landscapes.

Mythology supplies the grandest creatures of all. Ray Harryhausen's films are full of them, from the cyclops of The 7th Voyage of Sinbad to the hydra and harpies of Jason and the Argonauts, and Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters carries the Greek myths into the modern world. The Creatures and monsters guide suggests where to begin.

Switches, second chances and time travel

Few fantasy ideas are as reliable as the body swap. A mother and daughter, a father and son or two old friends wake up in each other's bodies, and by the end of the day each has learned to see the world through the other's eyes. Freaky Friday from 1976 is the original, written by Mary Rodgers from her own novel, and it has been remade as a 1995 television film with Shelley Long, Freaky Friday, and as a 2018 Disney Channel musical, Freaky Friday. Family Switch swaps an entire family at once, and Seventeen Again, A Saintly Switch and Love Switch find new variations on the theme.

Time travel sends heroes backward and forward through history. Time Bandits is the great classic, A Kid in King Arthur's Court and A Knight in Camelot drop modern visitors into the court of King Arthur, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III carries the turtles to feudal Japan, and Time Pirates and Timescape: Back to the Dinosaurs are lively recent adventures. Time at the Top uses an old elevator to reach the 1880s, and Otzi and the Mystery of Time brings a boy face to face with the famous iceman of the Alps.

Second chances form a gentle sub-genre of their own. The Kid brings Bruce Willis face to face with his eight-year-old self, Christmas...Again?! and Lacy's Christmas Do-Over let their heroines live the holidays again, and Heaven's Door follows a girl through a portal to visit her beloved grandfather. Read the Switches and time travel guide for a tour.

Herbie and the Disney fantasy comedies

From the late fifties to the early eighties, Walt Disney Productions made a long run of live-action comedies with a fantastic twist, and they remain some of the most cheerful films in the catalogue. The Disney fantasy comedies shelf collects 21 of them, along with their later remakes.

Herbie leads the way. The Love Bug tells how a down-on-his-luck racing driver played by Dean Jones discovers that the little Volkswagen he has bought has a personality of its own, and the car went on to star in Herbie Rides Again, Herbie Goes Bananas, the 1997 television film The Love Bug and Herbie Fully Loaded, in which Lindsay Lohan takes the wheel. Each film follows the same joyful formula: races, chases, a villain with designs on Herbie and a car that knows exactly who his friends are.

The Witch Mountain films, Escape to Witch Mountain, Return from Witch Mountain and the 1995 television remake Escape to Witch Mountain, follow two children with special powers and a mystery about where they come from. Blackbeard's Ghost brings back a pirate who must perform one good deed, and The Gnome-Mobile, Darby O'Gill and the Little People and The Island at the Top of the World show the studio at its most inventive. The shelf also holds The Return of the Shaggy Dog, in which a young lawyer turns into a sheepdog thanks to an ancient ring. The Disney fantasy comedies guide has a short tour.

Stage, ballet and the big top

Some of the most magical films on AnimeUnity were first performed in a theatre. The Stage and musicals shelf gathers 26 of them, from Broadway shows and ballets to the dreamlike acrobatics of Cirque du Soleil. Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical began life on the London stage before becoming a film, and Frozen: The Hit Broadway Musical and Dr. Seuss' The Grinch Musical capture full stage productions with all their songs and scenery.

Ballet lovers can choose between Nutcracker: The Motion Picture, the New York City Ballet's The Nutcracker, Tales of Beatrix Potter and the Royal Ballet's Royal Opera House: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, a riot of colour with a disappearing Cheshire Cat and a playing-card ballet. Cirque du Soleil fills its own corner with Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away, Cirque du Soleil: Journey of Man, Cirque du Soleil: O and Cirque du Soleil: Amaluna, each a wordless fantasy told through movement, music and light.

For a singalong, The Disney Family Singalong and its second volume gather famous voices around the songs of Disney classics, and Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular records the stage show that played at Disney California Adventure. Read the Stage and musicals guide for more.

Films for every age

Family fantasy covers a wide range of moods, from gentle bedtime stories to thrilling quests, and choosing the right film for the right evening makes all the difference. For the youngest viewers, the Sesame Street specials, The Christmas Toy, Tales from Muppetland: The Frog Prince, Kermit's Swamp Years and Barney's Great Adventure are short, bright and full of songs. The Cannon fairy tales and the Nutcracker films are also excellent choices for children who are just discovering stories.

Children from about seven upward will enjoy the Herbie films, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Doctor Dolittle, The Gnome-Mobile, A Simple Wish, Nim's Island and most of the Disney Channel films, which are designed for exactly this audience. The Good Witch films and the Christmas romances on the holiday shelf appeal to older viewers and parents, and teenagers often enjoy The Kid Who Would Be King, City of Ember, Inkheart and the Z-O-M-B-I-E-S musicals.

A few films have moments of real peril or a darker atmosphere and are best for children of nine or ten and older, or for watching together with a grown-up: Return to Oz, Time Bandits, Jason and the Argonauts, The Legend of Ochi and Where the Wild Things Are are all wonderful, and all have a scene or two that may surprise a very young viewer. Each film page gives the genres, the running time and the story, and the official services show age ratings and offer kids profiles.

Ideas for film nights

Fantasy films make memorable family evenings, and the catalogue offers endless combinations. For a storybook weekend, pair The Secret Garden with A Little Princess, two Frances Hodgson Burnett adaptations from the same decade, or follow Peter Pan with Pan for two very different journeys to Neverland. For a Harryhausen double bill, choose The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts, then look at the stop-motion creatures with fresh eyes in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.

For a musical evening, start with Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and finish with Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical. For a Herbie marathon, watch all five films in order, from The Love Bug to Herbie Fully Loaded, and see how the little car's adventures change with the decades. For a creature feature, try Harry and the Hendersons, The Water Horse and The Legend of Ochi, three films about families who welcome an unusual guest.

In December, the possibilities multiply. Begin with Santa Claus: The Movie, add Scrooge for a Dickens evening and Prancer for a snowy farm tale, and end on Christmas Eve with One Magic Christmas. Add your choices to My List, export the list for the television in the living room and settle in under a blanket.

How Watch now works

AnimeUnity is a guide, and every film page has a Watch now button that opens the film on JustWatch for the country you choose. JustWatch is a well-known service that tracks where films are available on subscription services, for rental or purchase, and on free services with advertising. The country menu next to the button lists fifteen countries, from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia to Italy, Germany, France, Spain and Brazil, and your choice is remembered in this browser.

Availability changes over time, as films move between services and new titles arrive, so the JustWatch page always shows the latest picture. Many of the classic films in the catalogue are also available on disc and from public libraries, and the older Disney titles are often gathered on the studio's own streaming service.

The films are presented in their original language, which for most of the catalogue is English, and the official services often add subtitles and dubbed versions in other languages. The Languages and versions guide explains how remakes and versions are listed, and Where AnimeUnity films stream describes the services behind the button.

The help pages

Fifteen short guides sit in the footer and at the bottom of the home page for anyone who would like a guided tour. How to watch with AnimeUnity follows a film from the poster grid to its official service, and My List explains how to save films and carry the list to another device.

The theme guides open the catalogue one shelf at a time: Storybook classics, Fairy tales, Christmas magic, Witches and wizards, Creatures and monsters, Switches and time travel, Disney fantasy comedies, Stage and musicals and Classic fantasy, each with a handful of recommendations and a link to the full shelf.

The practical pages cover Languages and versions, Where AnimeUnity films stream, The official AnimeUnity site, which describes the look of the real address, and Finding a film, with search tips for every corner of the catalogue.

The people behind the magic

A handful of names appear again and again on the shelves, and following them is a fine way to explore. Ray Harryhausen animated his creatures by hand, one frame at a time, and his films, from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad to Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, inspired generations of filmmakers. George Pal, the producer of Tom Thumb and The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm, brought puppet animation and dazzling trick photography to Hollywood family films.

Jim Henson and his company are everywhere in the catalogue, from Hey Cinderella! and Tales from Muppetland: The Frog Prince to The Christmas Toy, Monster Maker and the Sesame Street specials, and their puppets give these films a warmth and humour all their own. Rock Demers, the Canadian producer of the Tales for All series, made a string of gentle films about children with imaginations as big as the world.

On the Disney lot, director Robert Stevenson guided many of the classic fantasy comedies, including The Love Bug and Blackbeard's Ghost, and actor Dean Jones became the face of the studio's comedies of the late sixties. In more recent years, Disney Channel has made dozens of original films, and the Descendants musicals brought the children of famous fairy tale heroes and villains to life with songs and dance, most recently in Descendants: The Rise of Red.

What fantasy films teach

Behind the dragons and the flying cars, family fantasy films return to a few simple ideas. Courage is one of them: Dorothy in Return to Oz, Lina in City of Ember and Alex in The Kid Who Would Be King are ordinary children who discover that they are braver than they believed. Kindness is another, from the farm girl who nurses an injured reindeer in Prancer to the family who welcome a giant into their home in Harry and the Hendersons.

Imagination is perhaps the greatest theme of all. In IF, Bedtime Stories, Harold and the Purple Crayon, Sketch and Inkheart, the things children dream up become real, and the films invite young viewers to treasure their own inventiveness. Body swap films teach empathy by asking parents and children to walk in each other's shoes for a day, and the Christmas films remind everyone of generosity and the pleasure of giving.

Above all, these films celebrate the idea that wonder is all around us, waiting in a garden, a wardrobe, a lake or a toy shop. It is a message that children grasp instantly and grown-ups are glad to be reminded of, which is why so many of these films are watched again and again across the years.

Remakes, versions and series

Great stories are told again and again, and AnimeUnity gives every version its own page, with the year in the title so you can tell them apart. The Secret Garden appears three times, The Borrowers three times, Freaky Friday three times and Alice Through the Looking Glass three times, each version shaped by its decade. The 1966 television musical Alice Through the Looking Glass has Judi Rolin as Alice, while the 1998 version, Alice Through the Looking Glass, stars Kate Beckinsale.

Several series run across many films. The Good Witch has seven films, Dinotopia has a run of television episodes collected as films, the Sabrina films follow the famous teenage witch to Rome, and the Z-O-M-B-I-E-S musicals reach their fourth chapter with Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 4: Dawn of the Vampires. The Prehysteria films, the Munchie films and the Fairly Odd films are short, cheerful series that children often enjoy watching back to back.

Comparing versions is one of the pleasures of the catalogue. Watch the 1972 and 2021 versions of The Amazing Mr. Blunden, The Amazing Mr. Blunden and The Amazing Mr. Blunden, and see how a ghost story changes over half a century, or compare The Borrowers from 1973 with the 2011 BBC version, The Borrowers.

Fantasy through the year

The catalogue has a film for every season. Winter belongs to the Christmas shelf, with more than a hundred holiday films, and to the snowbound kingdoms of Snow Queen and the Nutcracker films. Spring is a time for gardens, and The Secret Garden, Tom's Midnight Garden and The Magic Faraway Tree are perfect for evenings when the days grow longer.

Summer suits sea and sky: Teen Beach Movie, Nim's Island, The Secret of Roan Inish and the Sinbad films, with their sailing ships and island adventures. Autumn is the season of gentle spooks and friendly monsters, with Under Wraps, Growing Fangs, Little Monsters, The Canterville Ghost and I Downloaded a Ghost all ideal for a cosy evening in October.

Happy viewing

Family fantasy films have a special place in many lives: the first film a child remembers, the film a family watches every Christmas, the film that made a young viewer want to write stories or build puppets or simply look for doors in old walls. AnimeUnity gathers 480 of them in one place, with a page for each and a button that leads to the official services, so the next magical evening is only a few clicks away. Pick a film, gather the family and enjoy the journey. Welcome to AnimeUnity.

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