The films I have chosen in this list seem to me to be those that have impacted  society immensely and led the way for 21st Century innovations in animation. They can be considered a list of old classics.

Animated movies are often a cherished element of childhood and have been so since the latter half of the 20th Century. For example, I recall one small girl that watched The Little Mermaid every day for two years. Modern kids often have a favorite animated VHS tape or DVD at home and they can even play them in the SUV on road trips.

Animation grabs the attention of children and can be used to calm, entertain, and educate them, all while making them laugh. I think this can be a good thing in moderation, Fourteen hours a day of animated films is likely a poor viewing diet, but a healthy place can be made for animated films in th elife of a child.

Many animated films are fitted with some more-advanced humor references tucked in between the speaking animals, princesses, and heroes in order to make them "fun for the entire family", They entertain adults as well and provide revenues for successful studios like Disney, Warner Brothers, Big Idea (Veggie Tales), Dreamworks (Moses; Madagascar, Penguins of Madagascar), and others.

Before Kindle book readers, CGI animation, and more-advanced technologies, there were silent black-and-white animated shorts books to stimulate the imagination and provide wholesome humor for children. Not all of us had many books growing up, though -- Craig Ferguson had a magic attic in his childhood home. He and his sister Lynn, a writer for his Late Late Show, still believe in the magic of that attic and their own imaginations. I thnk it shows especially in the musical numbers they use that feature puppets. Animation and puppetry are fun, adn some films combine both.

The greatest animated film of all time is likely one that have never viewed completely - Walt Disney's Fantasia.

I've seen clips from it and part of a "making of..." background film about it and know that for it's era, it was a huge project and very cutting edge. Today, Collector's DVDs are available of this animation, including scenes cut from the original film.

The clips I saw as a child on TV were my first introduction to Classic Music, leading me to love of Night on Bald Mountain and Cossack Dance. as well as images of outer space.

Fantasia was envisioned and produced as a feature-length concert film, an experiment in incorporating classical musical with attention-grabbing animated characters like dancing brooms, dancing mushrooms, ballet hippos, and many more.  A few of the classics from the film include:

• Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker Suite
• Paul Dukas's The Sorcerer's Apprentice
• Mussorgsky's Night on Bald Mountain
• Schubert's Ave Maria  

Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs is a Disney film that has impacted several generations of youngsters.

Based in part on the childrens' tale Snow White and Rose Red, this animated featured produced some of the most widely recognized characters, literary themes, and music around the world. the seven dwarfs and the Mirror-Mirror theme have been adapted and parodied in all forms of performance arts, comic strips, and literature.

In 1937, this film was the first full-length sound and color animated film in history. Previous films had been made with stop action in Germany and France, and with paper cutouts in Germany. Another was made in black-and-white in South America, and others were silent features or shorts.

Taking almost 4 years to complete, it was a major undertaking. Despite negative name-calling that called the project Disney's Folly, Snow White became one of the largest entertainment successes of all time.

Cinderella is the animated Disney feature that gave us our "proverbial rags to riches story" and proved to every little girl that any little girl can be a princess and grow up to be a queen of her own life.

This is my favorite Disney "princess films", because of the dance scene in which the magical mice repeatedly change the color of her ball gown (and because of talking mice). 

Gulliver's Travels is the successful 1939 Academy Award-nominated animated feature in Technicolor.

Its director was Dave Fleischer and with producer Max Fleischer of Fleischer Studios, he made Popeye and Betty Boop famous. Popeye was a favorite of mine and still is today.

This film was offerede as competition for Disney's Snow White and was also successful at the box office. Today the film is in the public domain and available on the Internet.

Pinocchio is based on the children's story Pinocchio: Tale of a Puppetby Carlo Collodi in 1883 and probably The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams in 1922.

In both stories, either a puppet wants to become a "real boy" or a stuffed toy bunny wants to become a "real rabbit." I think the message of each is that love received makes one a human being.

Pinocchio and its famous music and characters have become taken for granted in American culture. Poignantly, When You Wish Upon a Star was played over the Disneyland PA system when Walt Disney died and people cried, cast and guests alike.

This song and the philosophy behind it are the reasons that some people get a job at Disneyland straight out of high school and work clear through their retirement years. Guests keep coming back, sometimes begging to be carried if they are unwell. It's another world where dreams come true and one that many wish the real world could become.

The movie has affected American culture in many ways -- For example, what did Commander Riker call Data, the android-wishing-to-become-human in the first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation®? - Pinocchio.

Rudolph the Red–Nosed Reindeer is a Christmas classic since 1964.

Based on a Christmas poem from 1939, this TV animated film special has been aired at least once yearly since the early 1970s. it is usually shown several times in December so that no one misses it.

Several classic 20th Century Christmas songs are featured in this animation, many sung by Burl Ives's voicing as a snow man. In fact "A Holly Jolly Christmas" is played 1000s of times on the radio and some mall PA systems every holiday season in America.

Yellow Submarine

A friend of mine owns this DVD and I think that it is her favorite. Surreal and colorful and haring back to the time that the Beatles were together, it creates another world when she plays the DVD.

A classic short animated film from 1965, this one is usually shown during the winter holidays in combination with another Charlie Brown cartoon to make a full hour of viewing.

The film holds a halogen beam to the commercialization and capitsalistic-secularism of a faith-based Christmas. In the 1950s - 1960s, writers and comics such as Stan Freberg and Tom Lehrer hit this topic hard, and Charlie Brown lent a different angle to the argument. However, at least in Amerca, we still ahve two Christmas's - the secular celebration and the fatiehr-based birthday of Jesus. Everyone is free to celebrate, one, both, or neither. However, it has an effect on at least some children every year, persuading them not to over-consume.

Finding Nemo is all about fish, but really about people.

A young fish lad wants to be alllowed more freedom and authority over his own life and gets his chance at great expense. He is lost in a larger world of oceans, sea creatures, dentists, gulls, and acquariums. Somehow, he makes it back home with the help of his fellow acquarium mates form the dentist's office and his father becomes a bit more reasonable.

Not only does this film teach tolerance and respect of all races, genders, and ages under the umbrella of life in general, it is entertaining. For example, the see gulls screeching "Mine, mine, mine!" and the European valet-like acquarium shrimp make me laugh after many veiwings. The voices of Ellen DeGeneres and Stephen Root make the film all the more hilarious. 

Nightmare Before Christmas was released in 1993, offering the first of a new wave of Tim Burton animation.

Combining Halloween and Christmas with competition and dreams come true, this film is entertaining, odd, and unforgettable.

A couple of particularly comic scenes include a two-faced mayor that has a happy face on one half of his entire head and a mean face on the other and a mad scientist that opens his own skull on a hinge to scratch his brain while thinking.