Essential movies

[MerlinJones]

Anything Pixar
My Neighbor Totoro (any Hayao Miyazaki is good)
The Bad News Bears (original)
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Goonies
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
Star Wars trilogy (episodes 4-6)

 

[Mojo Ram]

Alien. All four of them. Because they're all classics.

Alien 3 gets a bad rap because the theatrical version makes little sense. The extended cut has an entire chunk of scenes cut out in the middle that really add to the movie. David Fincher did an amazing job considering the circumstances. Its hard to direct a movie with a script that's being changed everyday...not to mention it was his first movie.

Also the ending is a little better on the ext cut.

The Thing. The original version. Seriously awesome horror film.

I assume you mean Carpenters's version. If so yeah, thats an untouchable classic.

 

[LazyWinker]

I dont have any kids so cant really participate much, but just thought the movie "super 8" might be good since it revolves around kids and has aliens and military and is a decent movie.

I enjoyed this film! I can't be for certain but I think Elle Fanning is going to be a star.

Anyway here's some good movies to watch:
Short Circuit
Cool Hand Luke
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
All Dogs go to Heaven
The Never Ending Story
Coming To America
Trading Places
Beverly Hills Cop
Road House
Maximum Overdrive
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey
Wayne's World
Wayne's World II
The Mighty Ducks
Young Guns

PS - I thought by essential you meant 80's.