7 Greatest Kids Movies Set In The 1970s, Ranked
Simon Gallagher has worked in movie and TV journalism for more than 17 years. He has written more than 6000 articles and reviews, and edited thousands more. He is an expert in the entertainment industry, particularly in the golden age of screen superheroes. Simon is also a Rotten Tomatoes approved critic.
Cinema wasn’t invented in the 1970s, but the decade fundamentally rewired the culture of movies in several significant ways. Major franchises were born that continue today, including Star Wars, of course, and the movie branch of the Star Trek universe; martial arts took over the US; and horror was utterly transformed.
Even more fundamentally, the 1970s invented the blockbuster, with Jaws and Star Wars spearheading how the summer blockbuster formula was written, and Superman landing in December of 1978. The world was completely changed, Hollywood’s auteurs took a firm grip, and the shape of modern cinema started to form in earnest.
Family movies were a different matter: the summer blockbuster shifted more to four-quadrant tentpoles like Star Wars and Superman, but they weren’t explicitly for kids, and the financial hardships of the early years of the decade were felt most strongly by movies targeting younger audiences. But they were still being made: Disney was navigating its transitional post-Walt era, and delivered both The Aristocats and Robin Hood, and classic live-action movies like Freaky Friday and Escape to Witch Mountain were released.
It is perhaps most telling, though, that the majority of the best movies set in the 1970s weren’t actually set there. Hollywood’s shift to escapism left less space for family fare, but as the decades passed, the cultural moment was remembered more fondly when looked back upon. These are the best kids' movies set in the 1970s.
7 Minions: Rise of Gru (2022)
While the original Despicable Me films embraced a vague modern-meets-retro super-spy vibe, prequel Minions: The Rise of Gru is a full-blooded 1970s nostalgia-fest. Set in 1976, it follows the 11-year-old Gru’s attempts to prove his villainous mettle, with the box office catnip of his Minions in tow.
At this point, with the $1.1 billion success of the first movie under their belts, Illumination could have phoned in 90 minutes of their stars saying “banana”, and they probably would have still made 9 figures. But as Minions & Monsters even further proved, this is not a franchise that takes the easiest route, and instead, The Rise of Gru is a well-observed, adult-friendly pastiche of 1970s martial arts and slapstick comedy.
The ‘70s setting means there’s more style, and there’s a great soundtrack of major funk, pop, and soul hits of the decade, overseen, somewhat improbably, by Jack Antonoff.
6 The Boss Baby (2017)
Made some forty years after it’s actually set, Dreamworks’ phenomenally popular The Boss Baby - still one of the most watched movies of all time on Netflix - is less aggressively tied to 1977, when Theodore Templeton (Alec Baldwin) is born, but it’s still important.
The 1970s allow narrator and elder brother Tim (Tobey Maguire) to look back on his childhood with the benefit of wisdom and time. And they also allow for the removal of the convenience of modern technology that would make the whole secret baby society storyline harder to justify. It manifests mostly in the visual design of the Templeton’s world, which clashes with the high-tech hidden baby world to capture a sort of retro-futuristic charm.
The Boss Baby could have been a throwaway comedy animation, but that’s not really what you get from Dreamworks. Thanks to a great story and Baldwin’s brilliant performance, it’s genuinely very funny and rewatchable.
5 The Rescuers (1977)
Typically not widely remembered among the best Disney movies, The Rescuers was released in 1977 and was firmly set within its contemporary era. It’s also still one of the most atmospheric and visually distinct releases from Disney’s silver age and follows Bernard and Miss Bianca, noble mice members of the Rescue Aid Society.
It’s a charming adventure caper, with great performances by Bob Newhart and Eva Gabor that is perhaps overlooked because it can’t count on the memorable musical numbers of other Disney classics. But it has aged very well, because of the honesty of its emotional core and its enduring warmth and gentle comedy. It’s also probably the Disney film most suitable for fans of Don Bluth’s movies, with the darker aesthetic and more adult feel.
4 The Muppet Movie (1979)
Revisionists might try to claim that the golden age of the Muppet movie started with The Muppet Christmas Carol in 1992, but Jim Henson’s iconic characters actually had three distinct eras: the original movie period, started by The Muppet Movie in 1979, the Muppets do classics period in the 1990s (killed off by the uninspiring Muppets From Space), and the 2011 revival era. Sadly, almost all of them were undone by poor sequel choices.
At the tail-end of the 1970s, Jim Henson’s feature-length debut takes Kermit the Frog on a cross-country American road trip from the swamps of Georgia to the backlots of Hollywood, picking up some of the Muppets most famous veterans. It’s a delightfully kitsch adventure, with some timeless moments, and crowned, as if you needed to be reminded, by Kermit’s rendition of the beautiful "Rainbow Connection.” The Muppet Movie was also the only kids movie to break into the box office top 50 for the US for the whole decade.
3 Flight Of The Navigator (1986)
Though it was released in the 1980s, and bears the hallmarks of the sci-fi genre that was so quickly redefined by Amblin Entertainment, Flight of the Navigator actually opens in the late 1970s on 12-year-old David Freeman’s achingly typical suburban life. Without E.T. Randal Kleiser’s family-targeted sci-fi wouldn’t exist, but it goes further than merely aping what made Steven Spielberg’s touching masterpiece special.
There’s a lot of similar DNA though, which is partly why Flight of the Navigator has gone on to be such a cult gem. It has a similar sinister government element and a charming alien (albeit a talking spaceship), and most of the charm comes from the journey of wonder as the two very different lead characters discovering each other and themselves.
Flight of the Navigator is also notable for its firsts: it was a pioneering project for digital effects (and has the first example of CGI lightning), and though they’re now very dated, it doesn’t ruin the charm. And Paul Reubens’ voice performance as Max is a joy, including his Pee Wee Hermann-like laugh at the end.
2 My Girl (1991)
It’s still quite jarring that one of the best coming-of-age movies ever made, which formed such an important part of so many 1990s kids lives was actually set decades earlier. The bittersweet, intoxicatingly charming tale of Vada Sultenfuss (Anan Chlumsky) is set during the summer of 1972 in a small Pennsylvania town that feels like the center of the entire world.
My Girl is inevitably remembered for the heartbreaking death of Macaulay Culkin’s Thomas J. Sennett, which has taken on a whole new life in the age of social media. And even more than 30 years on, the emotional storyline lands an overwhelming punch. It forms the heart of Vada’s journey to find herself as her family dynamic changes, and the 1970s setting forms the perfect backdrop to celebrating the sun-soaked charm of lost childhood summers.
There’s never been a movie that so respectfully honors childhood emotions (until the also very good sequel came along), and which somehow managed to capture universal elements of everyone’s lives, despite how specific it is to Vada.
1 Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory (1971)
Part of the magic of Roald Dahl’s storytelling is that they’re always vague enough to be timeless, built more on emotions and magic than specific decades (apart from maybe Danny, Champion of the World). But Mel Stuart’s wonderful, musical adaptation very definitely set itself in the early 1970s context it was made in.
Adapted from Dahl's beloved novel, Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory is a masterclass of fantastical cinema that used the drab 1970s aesthetic of the real England as the perfect counterpoint to Wonka’s magical world. It’s an accidentally brilliant artistic choice, as the gloomy European aesthetic underlines just what Charlie needs to leave behind.
Gene Wilder’s breathtaking performance as Willy Wonka is also a masterclass, balancing chaotic eccentricity, sharp wit, and a subtle darkness that Johnny Depp’s deranged kids TV host failed to fully grasp in the remake. Wilder was gentler for the most part, and warm, which made his outbursts all the more affecting. And even with the knowledge that modern filmmaking and effects work could capture a more impressive factory, there’s something incredibly endearing about the 1970s practical work that went into building the world of pure imagination.
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