Family

Family is the hardest genre to get right because it has the hardest audience: everyone. A family film has to work for a six-year-old and a grandparent at the same time, to be funny enough for the kid and smart enough for the adult, and to end in a way that sends everyone off happy. The ones that manage it become permanent.

The best of it is not watered down. The great family films — animation and live action alike — trust children with real emotion, real stakes and real jokes, and trust the adults to find the second layer underneath.

Use it for: the holiday viewing, the rainy Sunday, the film that becomes the family's shorthand. Don't expect it for: edge — family entertainment trades cynicism for warmth, on purpose.

The test of a great one: the kid laughs, the adult cries, and neither is quite sure why the other is doing it.