Are children's films today afraid of scaring them?

Yes, the danger must be growing, 'cause the rowers keep on rowing, and they're certainly not showing, any signs that they are slowing.

It was like someone drugged me and snatched me from my home, I awoke somewhere else to find David Lynch's Eraserhead playing, because it can't be the same innocent kid's film I had been watching all morning, it was disturbing and frightening and I had my hands over my eyes, peering out only to see something wish I hadn't. That was one of my strongest memories of seeing Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory as a child, but I loved it. It was something we'd always see at Christmas, it was tradition, and I'd watch it year after year, my eyes still covered at that infamous tunnel scene.

Thinking back, a lot of my favourite films as a child were often quite scary or disturbing, sometimes downright depressing, and it strikes me that a lot of those films just wouldn't be the same if they were made today. Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is good example of this, it's just fairly dull compared to the 1971 version that had left so many kids cowering, and I'd say Burton's film is just going to be forgotten.

Watership Down was a children's film that was more harrowing than Schindler's List, utterly terrifying, soaked in violence, death and disturbing imagery. I don't think any film has ever had me so emotionally flogged, it was so incredibly powerful and bleak, but it has secured itself as a favourite of mine, I had it on VHS and nearly wore the tape out. It's amazing to think something for children that horrifying ever got made, but to a whole generation, it's a part of their childhood. The Plague Dogs was equally bleak and depressing, perhaps even more so as it lacked Watership Down's happy ending.

I remember reading a woman's online rants not so long ago about Spirited Away, having taken her daughter to see it, she thought the scene where Chihiro's parents turned into pigs was far too disturbing for children, so she took her daughter and left. I do get the feeling that maybe parents are getting overprotective of their children in this regard, shielding them from anything that might scare them or make them cry. Interestingly, another favourite of mine as a kid was Ron Howard's Willow, which had a scene of people being turned into pigs that absolutely scared the pants off me.

Growing up in the 80's, you'd have seen quite a few films aimed at youngsters that were outright chilling, such as Return to Oz, which wouldn't have been a favourite of mine as I've only seen it once, but it certainly left it's mark, those wheelers were the stuff of nightmares. Jim Henson's classic The Dark Crystal was suitably terrifying as well, with giant beetles, an old woman with a removable eye, a soul-draining torture chamber, it was all pretty dark stuff indeed and I loved it.

Without a doubt, one of my favourite films as a kid was Transformers: The Movie, and I was in absolute tears when Optimus Prime died. Here was my childhood hero, and I watched him die on an operating table. Animation had so much more balls back then, and it wasn't afraid to show something that could make a child have nightmares, or leave them in tears. Today, the most we can expect to see in kids films are jokes that are somewhat risque, but that's sadly about it.

Pixar are doing great things, and I really loved The Incredibles, but I've felt that they always play things very safe, being careful not to make the audience sad at any point. There's one scene in Ratatouille that I've felt really held back, where Remy was separated from his family it could have really tugged on the heart strings, but they just pushed through the moment.

I do wonder about how kids are going to turn out, because people who are in their 20's now had so much death, grief and violence introduced to them through media when they were growing up, that it probably prepared an entire generation for life's hardships. The Harry Potter films are the only ones I can really think of that'll scare some kids, and they do incorporate some rather dark themes, but I do get the overall sense that the British franchise is the last bastion of darkness aimed at young viewers, and that there's a steady move towards cencorship and mollycoddling.

A lot of people shed tears when Bambi's mother was killed, but can anyone think of a more recent children's film that had that kind of impact? That upset children so deeply? I'd dearly love to see a film that will be that memorable again. Something tells me that the upcoming Shrek Goes Fourth won't be it.