Kids get Hollywood's best stuff. (Now Playing).(Brief Article)

Who gets the most respect from Hollywood today?

After taking a look back at 2001, you could easily argue that it's young children. The ratio of quality films to clutter hasn't been good for adults--we faced the usual high chances of being ripped off or insulted rather than entertained when we ventured into movie theaters this past year.

The options for small children were much brighter. Spy Kids got things off to a boisterous start last spring, followed by summer's Shrek, and the positive trend has continued with the recent releases of Monsters, Inc. and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. In short, there's been more reason than usual of late to envy youth.

It's no wonder that children's films have been so accomplished this year, considering the talent level involved. The eminently enjoyable, G-rated Monsters is the latest creation of Pixar Animation Studios, arguably the best movie production company working right now. Pixar concentrates exclusively on computer-animated kids' movies, a field the studio perfected with A Bug's Life, Toy Story, and Toy Story 2. Each of those movies looks at the world through the innocent, imaginative eyes of a child, a feat pulled off once again in Monsters, Inc., which follows an inquisitive little girl who manages to tame the scary creatures in her bedroom closet. Melding ingenious storytelling with stunning technological prowess, Pixar's pictures are fast becoming fairy tales for a new generation.

Even so, Pixar doesn't have a stranglehold on the kids' flick business, a fact that became clear with the arrival of DreamWorks Pictures' computer-animated Shrek. Matching Pixar in visual and narrative wit, DreamWorks demonstrated itself to be a formidable competitor with this spoof of and homage to classic make-believe stories. And that's good news for fans of computer-animated storytelling, since we'll be the main beneficiaries as these two studios try to outdo each other.

It's not only top production Talent--kids have also been getting top material. In addition to the William Steig children's book that inspired Shrek, film studios have, of course, adapted J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, the biggest phenomenon in children's literature in years. The story of an 11-year-old boy who discovers he's a wizard and goes off to learn his ...