Paddington.
Photo: Warner Bros.
This list is regularly updated as movies rotate on and off of Prime Video. *New additions are indicated with an asterisk.
The selection of family films on Amazon Prime’s streaming service leaves a little something to be desired, but that just makes a guide like this even more useful! You have to dig through the titles on Prime Video to find something appropriate for everyone from kindergartener to great grandpa, but there are some titles worth a look, including some family classics that you may have forgotten.
Year: 2021
Runtime: 1 hour, 33 minutes
Directors: Greg Tiernan and Conrad Vernon
The characters created by Charles Addams will never grow old, even if this recent animated hit isn’t exactly their best outing. There’s still just enough to like in this sequel to the 2019 animated debut of the Addams Family, especially in the voice work by Oscar Isaac, Charlize Theron, Nick Kroll, Bill Hader, Wallace Shawn, and many more. This one is about a road trip for the Addams clan and despite being generally ignored during the pandemic, it still made a fortune. They’re going to be making Addams movies forever.
Year: 1995
Runtime: 1h 30m
Director: Betty Thomas
Movies based on beloved sitcoms are almost always a waste of time but Betty Thomas knew how to take the crowd-pleasing comedy of The Brady Bunch and twist it into a subversive satire of suburban norms. She took the 1970s family and dropped them in the ‘90s, turning their values and styles into fish-out-of-water humorous targets. It’s still a surprisingly funny movie.
Year: 2021
Runtime: 1h 53m
Director: Kay Cannon
Another year, another Cinderella movie. The original one on Prime belongs to pop superstar Camila Cabello, who channeled her fame from the music world into this jukebox musical take on the classic tale. That means familiar hits, intertwined with a few original songs. It’s not the best Cinderella, but it’s not the worst either. Maybe it will be the shoe that fits you.
Year: 2021
Runtime: 1h 37m
Director: Walt Becker
This adaptation of the children’s book series about the giant dog was originally scheduled for a theatrical release but ended up shuffled onto Paramount+ in late 2021 before also being made available to Prime subscribers. It’s just sweet enough to make this list, thanks in large part to a game cast that includes a fun Tony Hale and Kenan Thompson.
Year: 2018
Runtime: 1h 28m
Director: Nick Park
Aardman is just the best. Still mostly known for Wallace & Gromit (and maybe now Shaun the Sheep), the stop-motion masters have made other films too, including this film about a tribe of Stone Age people facing off against the future when bronze-using invaders challenge them to a game of football. Nick Park directed this funny flick that may not be Aardman’s best, but minor Aardman is still a family film worth seeing.
Year: 1985
Runtime: 1h 53m
Director: Richard Donner
Richard Donner’s adventure film became one of the most beloved original properties of the decade with its family fun mixed with legitimate scares. The story of a group of kids who try to save their homes from foreclosure and discover an old treasure map in the process blends humor and action in a way that doesn’t really happen in family movies anymore. It’s held up wonderfully.
Year: 2022
Runtime: 1h 27m
Director: Derek Drymon and Jennifer Kluska
The massive blockbuster franchise of Hotel Transylvania films took a surprising turn in early 2022 when the pandemic forced this once-Sony property into a Prime Video exclusive. Likely the final film in this four-movie series, this one sees Dracula (Adam Sandler) becoming a human as his son-in-law (Andy Samberg) becomes a monster. Of course, it’s about what’s on the inside that really counts. Everybody knows that.
Year: 2010
Runtime: 1h 37m
Director: Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois
The movies based on the book by Cressida Cowell comprise one of the best trilogies of the 2010s. It all started with this DreamWorks adventure film about a boy (Jay Baruchel) who befriends a dragon named Toothless, despite his people’s fear of the flying creatures. A classic tale of never judging a book by its cover, this a beautiful adventure tale, a movie with equal amounts of heart and spirit.
Year: 1999
Runtime: 1h 26m
Director: Brad Bird
Before The Incredibles, Brad Bird made a different kind of superhero movie, a 1999 masterpiece that pays homage to Americana and entertainment from generations before while also remaining somehow timeless. The story of a boy who finds a literal giant robot in the woods has only gained popularity and power in the two decades since it was released. It’s a perfect movie.
Year: 1946
Runtime: 2h 10m
Director: Frank Capra
One of the most beloved films of all time doesn’t just have to be watched around the holidays. The lessons in this film about what people value in life could be appreciated any time of the year, as could one of the most iconic performances in film history from Jimmy Stewart.
Year: 2010
Runtime: 1h 35m
Director: Tom McGrath
A great voice cast does most of the work here in a film that skewers superhero tropes years before that became something that everybody does. Will Ferrell voices the title character, a supervillain who actually kills his nemesis, Metro Man (Brad Pitt). With no one to fight, the bad guy becomes the hero after he creates a new version of Metro Man that’s even worse than he is. It’s a little dated already but Ferrell, Pitt, and Tina Fey do a lot of heavy lifting.
Year: 1997
Runtime: 1h 37m
Director: Gore Verbinski
The great Gore Verbinski directed this 1997 black comedy that works for the whole family. On the surface, it’s the story of two brothers tormented by one small mouse in a house they’ve inherited from their father. It’s filled with great physical humor from Nathan Lane and Lee Evans, who crib their style from classic comedy duos like Laurel & Hardy and Abbott & Costello.
Year: 2015
Runtime: 1h 35m
Director: Paul King
One of the sweetest family films ever made adapts the classic talking bear to modern London when Paddington (Ben Whishaw) finds his way there from “Darkest Peru,” looking for a new home. He finds one with an average family led by Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins, but crosses paths with a nefarious taxidermist (a wonderful Nicole Kidman) who tries to take him down. This is such a gently funny and likable movie. You kind of have to be a jerk to hate it.
https://www.amazon.com/Paddington-Ben-Whishaw/dp/B00SB2OYL0/
Year: 2022
Runtime: 1h 37m
Director: Rob Minkoff, Mark Koetsier, Chris Bailey
A loose remake of Blazing Saddles, this 2022 CGI animated film barely made any waves when it was released last Summer, but it’s not bad! Michael Cera, Ricky Gervais, Samuel L. Jackson, Michelle Yeoh, and even Mel Brooks himself contribute voice work to the tale of a dog who becomes a samurai to help rescue a cat village from its awful owner.
Year: 2011
Runtime: 1h 30m
Director: Chris Miller
When Shrek 2 became one of the biggest animated films ever made, plans were put in motion to spin off Antonio Banderas’s heroic kitty into his own franchise, which arguably reached its peak with last year’s excellent Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. This first film isn’t that good (and that other one’s on Netflix, by the way) but it’s still fun, and might be of interest to kids who saw last year’s movie and wonder where it all began.
Year: 2014
Runtime: 1h 41m
Director: Carlos Saldanha
Remember Blue Sky? The company behind Ice Age tried for another hit franchise with a bunch of colorful Brazilian birds, and the first movie was successful enough to produce a reasonably entertaining sequel. Rio 2 is all about bright colors, catchy music, and fun voice work from people like Jesse Eisenberg, Anne Hathaway, Jamie Foxx, Tracy Morgan, and many more.
Year: 2022
Runtime: 2h 2m
Director: David Mickey Evans
With a third film in production, it kind of feels like these films about the fast little blue guy are the first new mega-franchise of the pandemic, right? And something interesting about them is how quickly Paramount has worked to make them available to subscribers. This film jumped from theatres to Paramount+ before it was even on Blu-ray and now it’s on Prime Video too. There’s a reason kids love these movies. Watch for yourself and find out why.
Year: 1973
Runtime: 1h 45m
Director: Martin Ritt
It may not be the kind of family film that Minions fans are looking for, but why not challenge your kids with something more grounded every now and then? Sounder is more than just the story of a dog. It’s a tale of the Deep South during the Great Depression, anchored by stunning performances from Paul Winfield and Cicely Tyson, both of whom earned Oscar nominations for their work here, and the movie was also nominated for Best Picture.
Year: 2014
Runtime: 1h 41m
Director: Jonathan Liebesman
Who could have guessed that the pizza-loving turtles would become such a long-lasting franchise that an animated reboot film called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem is hitting theaters later this year. Before then, go back and check out the last reboot attempt in the live-action flick starring Megan Fox, Will Arnett, and the voices of Tony Shalhoub and Johnny Knoxville. It’s a silly movie but it’s just old enough that it might be nostalgic already for the right Prime subscriber.
Year: 1974
Runtime: 1h 37m
Director: Norman Tokar
A lot of children of the ‘80s probably watched this in middle school and were never quite the same. Relive the trauma! Based on the 1961 novel of the same name, this is the tale of an ordinary 12-year-old boy who is obsessed with hunting dogs, even though his family can’t afford them. A moving, challenging story well-told, this is a great option for a book that everyone in the family can read and a film everyone in the family can watch together.
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