The Croods

Chris Sanders and Kirk DeMicco set the argument of their 2013 animation at the outset and never alter it: the father treats everything new as a danger, his daughter wants light. The quarrel is replayed throughout, so a child follows unaided while an adult knows where it lands. None of the animals here are real; each is a hybrid invented for the film. The crew described the design by saying the world itself is the villain, made of tar, volcanoes and water, so almost every sequence is a chase or a fall. Announced in 2005 under a different title, it was to be stop motion at Aardman. That studio withdrew in 2007, the rights returned to DreamWorks, and the stone age idea Aardman kept became its own film years later. John Cleese was among the writers of the earliest drafts. Roger Deakins came in as lighting consultant, and the crew shot high dynamic range photographs of an overcast beach and a cave interior to drive the film’s lighting. A good fit for a household that wants the father’s fear named out loud in the first scene and openly resolved at the end. Not for you if you want the creatures to be real animals: every species is invented, and a child who asks which one existed gets no answer.