Family Movie Nights

To help families spend time together and share common experiences, The Leadership Institute provides recommendations for Family Movie Night. Each week, a new movie recommendation and explanation is available for your consideration. Enjoy the show!

If you are looking to see where a particular movie is streaming or is available online, please visit https://www.justwatch.com

A Matter of Life and Death
When Royal Air Force pilot Peter Carter (David Niven) is forced to jump from his plane without a parachute, he expects to die. So he’s surprised to wake up on… Read More
The Book Thief
This week’s film is a war time drama that’s more appropriate for older viewers. It’s 1938 in Germany when young Liesel is forced to move in with new foster parents.… Read More
Grave of the Fireflies
This week’s film is more appropriate for older viewers. It’s also one of the saddest films ever made, so be sure to have the Kleenex nearby. It’s 1945, and the… Read More
A Bag of Marbles
Joseph is a young boy living in occupied France in the early 1940s. He’s not sure why he’s supposed to wear a yellow star on his jacket. His world is… Read More
Joan of Arc
Although All Saints’ Day refers to all saints, both known and unknown, here’s a classic 1948 film about one of the most famous saints. Devout in her faith and dedicated… Read More
Au revoir, les enfants
This week’s film, whose title translates to Goodbye, Children, is a foreign drama that’s more appropriate for older viewers. In 1944 occupied France, the young Julien miserably returns to the… Read More
Empire of the Sun
It’s the 1940s, and Jamie Graham (played by a young Christian Bale) is a British schoolboy living in Shanghai with his parents. He enjoys an upper class lifestyle, but takes… Read More
Unbroken
Here’s another film more appropriate for older viewers. With the Olympic games currently underway in Japan, here’s a true story about an Olympic runner in Japan… albeit under very different… Read More
A Hidden Life
“Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.” (Colossians 3:2-3) A Hidden Life tells the… Read More
Joyeux Noel
Intensely moving World War I tale of soldiers — Scottish, French and German — who spontaneously agree to a cease-fire on the Western front on Christmas Eve as they hear… Read More