Prince of Egypt

I rewatched this classic animated musical from my childhood with a friend this week in honor of Passover, she had never seen it (gasp!), and I remembered how good it is! Watching a movie from your childhood always gives you a warm and fuzzy feeling, but to have it actually hold up as a quality movie is even better.

The songs are really well written, I would see an actual stage musical of this. A bunch of them have stuck in my head for a long time, and I was thankful to be reminded how what they were from. The songs weren't gimmicky (for the most part), they feel authentic, and truly spoke to the feelings of the characters in the film. I was most blown away by how they directly and unabashedly addressed the religious issues. You can't tiptoe and be PC around them in a Moses story. I'm a religious studies/film minor, so I'm always interested in seeing how its dealt with on film, and I was impressed. The burning bush scene was fantastic! So much more believable than silly stuff in "Ten Commandments" etc. (animation kinda helped on that) And having the voice of God be the same voice as the one for Moses solves the dilemma of having to case someone for God (though Morgan Freeman will always be my choice....). Instead, it suggests that God just echoes ones own voice (or is it that God sounds like Moses? Glad he didn't for Charlton Heston, that would be frightening). And having Jeff Goldbloom voice Aaron? GENIUS. I'd follow that guy through any desert.

Great kids movie. Great musical. Great Hebrew epic. Except for the Michelle Pfeiffer voicing Zipporah part, but I'll forgive them that.