Growing up has its advantages—driving, independence, credit cards, bills, taxes—but being forced into a dark theater to watch, yet again, another children’s movie made me realize not growing up sometimes has even more.
I learned this as I watched another panorama of painfully bright colors, fast action and little dialogue blur across the screen in “Spirit,” a tale good at its heart and fun to sit through, with some interesting new approaches (though it, along with other big-screen cartoons, has repackaged and glossed over American history), but not the best animated children’s movie ever to be drawn.

So, to indulge my rediscovery of youth’s allure, I spent a thoroughly unproductive day not cleaning, not paying bills and not doing laundry to curl up in my La-Z-Boy, flip on the VCR and rewatch some of the old and new classics of the animated genre and sacrifice my adulthood to the over-exuberant, zit-faced and bespectacled child still squirming around inside me. And in the spirit of contagious youth, I give you my 10 favorite guilty pleasures in the world of inky features:

Squeaking in at No. 10 is “The Great Mouse Detective.” How could you not shiver with Vincent Price behind the voice of the dastardly Professor Ratigan and cheer on Basil as he flopped down Baker Street? And with Ron Clements’ writing behind the lens, you could giggle and gasp at the talent that later would bring us “Aladdin” and “The Little Mermaid.”

But mice wouldn’t stop there with their heroic antics, as proved in “The Rescuers.” Swooping in with their albatross at No. 9, Bernard and Bianca skittered across the screen with cute, endearing charm, largely due to their voice actors, Bob Newhart and Eva Gabor, and in greater part, again, to the writer: Ken Anderson, the man who brought us “The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh” and two other films on this list.

From extravagant to more realistic, a mouse’s plight has never been more poignant than in my No. 8 pick, “The Secret of NIMH.”I cried at Timmy’s illness, laughed at Jeremy the crow’s antics (brilliantly voiced by Dom DeLuise) and covered my eyes — still do — when Mrs. Brisby went to visit the Great Owl, one of the creepiest characters ever to have cracked mouse bones beneath its claws and shiver cobwebs off its wings.

Don Bluth achieved one of his greatest stories with “NIMH,” but didn’t stop there. He continued to give us “The Land Before Time” and “An American Tail,” No. 7 on my list of adolescent whim. Fievel Mousekewitz remains one of the most adorable rodents ever to bound across the screen with sleeves dangling to his toes and his Papa’s hat bouncing atop his nose. “Somewhere Out There” can still make me snivel pathetically and awaken the fear every child felt when watching Fievel get tossed about in flood waters deep enough to swallow you thrice over: Losing parents.

Orphans were nothing new to the animated world. Also cursed with clothing sewn to fit a horse, Wart charmed his simpleton way into my heart as a young King Arthur in “The Sword in the Stone,” No. 6. Based on the first part of T.H. White’s novel, “The Once and Future King,” it is in no way an accurate depiction, but a fun one unsullied by the heavier tones White anchors his work with at the end. The wizard war will forever remain one of my favorite moments in animation history as Merlin outwits Madame Mim by becoming a germ, and the squirrel versions of the victorious magician and Wart never fail to cause spontaneous bouts of snickering.

And while Merlin’s pupil so eagerly hopped into the skins of animals, a prince fought years to escape the same fate in my No. 5 treasure, “Beauty and the Beast.” A beautiful lesson in loving people for who they are, not what they seem to be, Belle enchants with her trust and the stock of singing appliances clatter in with their escapades to keep the darker persecution in this movie from getting too black, with Gaston thrown in for good measure to frighten women everywhere into the realization that somewhere the basis for that character exists.

Though the struggle between man and animal has always been a popular plot for the cartoon industry, “The Lion King” threw out man altogether and created an amazing tale of birthright and comeuppance as No. 4. With a voice cast including James Earl Jones, Jeremy Irons, Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane, Cheech Marin and Rowan Atkinson (better known as Mr. Bean), this movie guzzled up talent and regurgitated it with keen storytelling and unforgettable music. (“I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts” should have topped the charts.)

More big names were lassoed for No. 3, “Toy Story.” With Tom Hanks and Tim Allen behind Pixar’s CGI and John Lasseter’s script, a cowboy’s old-fashioned hospitality almost gets laser-blasted by a spaceman’s new-fangled widgets. Sampling from toys we, and our parents, grew up with and children still jot down on their Christmas lists today, the magic idea of our toys being as alive as we pretended them to be can’t fail to nudge a memory or 10 of our own childhood.

Believing toys could come to life made talking animals much easier to swallow, and never was a cast of voices so expertly chosen as the one for “The Jungle Book.” Rudyard Kipling can rest easier knowing his Disney-fied story (provided by Anderson) remains nestled at No. 2 in my heart. Baloo the Bear’s approach to life, Bagheera the Panther’s healthy cynicism and the delightfully evil, rich tones of Sher Kahn still dissolve my grown-up spine into a puddle of prepubescent ooze. I only wish George Sanders (the voice behind the conniving Kahn and better known for oiling his way across the screen in films such as “All About Eve,” “Rebecca” and “The Ghost and Mrs. Muir”) had been tapped as a voice actor more before his death.

My sadness can be allayed, though, by the fact Phil Harris (Baloo’s lazy timbre) was exploited several more times, even as Little John in my No. 1 animated children’s movie (also written by the talented Anderson)—the toe-tappin’, boisterous, foxy “Robin Hood.” Even with Peter Ustinov’s expertly annoying whining through Prince John, I can’t help but love this animalistic makeover of an outlaw with a heart of gold (most of which has been stolen). I’ll take that singing rooster over “Aladdin, Part VIII” any day.

Since making this list is the most adult thing I’ve done all day, I think I’ll turn off my computer and succumb again to my former geeky child (not to be confused with my current geeky grown-up) with an encore viewing of my favorite animated animals.

If you have children, indulge them for a day and let them simply be children (you’re an adult, you can bend the rules!). If you don’t have a child, go be one yourself—and eat a packet of Kool-Aid mix for me, too, while you’re at it.

Originally published by the Tyler Morning Telegraph.