A sumptuous (if completely inaccurate) animated retelling of the mystery of the Tsar’s lost daughter, this movie will captivate kids and their families.

In this version, the little Anastasia and her adored grandmother (voice of Angela Lansbury) are separated after escaping the execution of the royal family. Years later, “Anna” (voice of Meg Ryan), who remembers nothing of her early years, leaves the orphanage where she has been raised, and goes off in search of her family. She is discovered by a couple of con men who have been searching for a young woman they can pass off as Anastasia, to get a reward from the dowager grandmother, who now lives in Paris. They persuade her that they are just trying to help her find out whether she is in fact the missing Anastasia, never suspecting that she really is.

Trying to stop her is the evil spectre Rasputin, who becomes so angry that pieces of his face and body fall off and have to be reapplied.

The animators learned their craft at Disney, and it shows. Other than the mostly forgettable score, the production is first-class, with an appealing heroine, exciting action, glamorous settings, and a tender love story. Anna is smart, brave, and loyal. She is also a rare leading lady who vanquishes the bad guy on her own.

Note: kids may be concerned that, having found her grandmother, Anastasia leaves again, not wanting the life of an expatriate princess. Younger kids may be upset by the (offscreen) execution of the Tsar’s family and the scary villain.

Older kids will want to know more about the real story. They may like seeing a live-action (but also fictionalized) version also called “Anastasia,” starring Ingrid Bergman (who won an Oscar), Helen Hayes, and Yul Brynner, or a later version made for television starring Amy Irving.

Watch out — they’re trying to sell this movie as a thriller with supernatural overtones, but it turns out that it is a very traditional love story, and a surprisingly touching one, too.

Jennifer Lopez plays Sharon, a cop who is fearless on the streets but not ready to get close to anyone. As she tells one guy when he tries to get to know her over dinner, “I’m not very good at the whole dating thing,” She goes home to her apartment and lies on her bed in her bulletproof vest.

One day, just as an assailant is about to shoot Sharon, a mysterious stranger (Jim Caviezel) arrives to save her life. She is surprised to find herself drawn to him even though he tells her nothing about himself. All he will tell her is that his name is Catch.

Sharon investigates and interrogates people for a lving. She is not sure how much it is fair to expect to learn about someone in a relationship, so she does not push. In fact, it gives her some breathing room because she does not feel crowded by questions about her own past. She finds something freeing about a relationship between people who have only the present.

The connection between the two of them will be a mystery only to those people who have never seen a movie. But there is an appealing lightness and even a little wisdom the way their relationship unfolds. Sharon calls Catch and when he answers she tells him to hang up so that she can call his machine. She is not comfortable enough to talk to him directly, but at least she is able to tell him that.

Sharon and Catch both have to accept their pasts before they can face the future together. Although it is terrifying, they have to be honest with themselves before they can really be close to each other. Both blame themselves for family tragedies, and both have to accept that it is all right to go on from that. The movie has the great good sense to leave things a little messy.

Maybe Jennifer Lopez should stick with playing cops. This is her best performance since she played a marshall in “Out of Sight.” Caviezel, following roles in “Frequency” and “Pay it Forward,” seems to be the current go-to guy for playing “guys weird stuff happens to.” Screenwriter Gerald DePego and director Luis Mandoki show us the warm, easy connection between Sharon and Catch, and they make it clear that love alone is not the cure, just the motive to allow yourself to heal.

Parents should know that the movie is rated R for very strong language, brief non-explicit nudity and sexual references and situations. Characters are in peril and some are shot. There is a fatal automobile accident and a child is killed offscreen. Sharon jokes that she was looking for a man to “clean her pipes.” There are references to domestic abuse, and we see a woman who has been hit in the face.

Families who see this movie should talk about how we can find a way to create a balance between privacy and intimacy, between mourning a loss and moving on, between trying to make things better and accepting something less than perfect. They may also want to talk about Sharon’s conflicts over how to respond to her father’s abuse of her mother. When Sharon and Catch first become close, she asks him to kiss her somewhere she has never been kissed before — it may be worth discussing with teenagers the importance of keeping yourself precious enough so that you can give the person you love something that is just for the two of you.

Audiences who enjoy this movie will also enjoy some of the classic old romances like “I’ll be Seeing You” with Ginger Rogers and Joseph Cotten, “Love Letters” with Cotten and Jennifer Jones, and “One Way Passage” with William Powell and Kay Francis.

Feivel Mousekewitz is a little Russian mouse who emigrates to the United States with his family, after they are told that “there are no cats in America and the streets are paved with cheese.” He becomes separated from his parents and sister, and is forced to work in a sweatshop by the evil Warren T. Rat (a cat in disguise). Feivel is resilient and courageous, and finds friends (including a kind cat) who help him until he finds his family. The score features the hit song, “Somewhere Out There.”

Families who see this movie should talk about how their own ancestors came to America (or wherever else they settled) and about the immigrant experience.

The sequel, “An American Tail: Feivel Goes West” features the voice of Jimmy Stewart as the slow-talking Sheriff Wylie Burp.

This movie should be called “Smart and Smarter.” In addition to the thrilling story, masterful performances, and impeccable technical authenticity, it is a heartening story of the triumph of smart guys with slide rules, a relief in this era of movies about characters who triumph by being dumb. Two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks plays real-life astronaut- hero Jim Lovell in this true story of the mission to the moon that almost left three astronauts stranded in space, when an oxygen tank exploded. Even though we know it turned out all right, even though the technical material is dense and the action is confined to a space smaller than an elevator, the tension is breathtaking, as the astronauts and the mission control team in Houston try to think their way back home. Everything from duct tape to the cover of the flight manual to one of the astronaut’s socks is used in this pre-McGuyver story, where mission control asks simply, “What’s good on that ship?” and builds from there.

Because of the technical material and intensity of the story, it is a good idea to prepare younger kids beforehand by telling them what the movie is about, and you may want to reassure them, since it is a true story, that the astronauts did come home all right.

Talk to older kids about the way that Mission Control solves the problems happening thousands of miles away, by re-creating the conditions inside the spaceship. Point out how the adults handle the strain, sometimes losing their tempers or blaming one another (or trying to escape blame), but mostly working very well together. Lovell and Ken Mattingly (Gary Sinese) were presented with a very tough problem when exposure to the measles led Mission Control to pull Mattingly from the mission. Lovell tries to insist that Mattingly go along, but ultimately realizes that the good of the mission has to override his feelings of loyalty. Kids may have their own ideas about how this should have been handled.

The legendary “Failure is not an option,” said by Gene Kranz, head of Mission Control, when most people were certain the astronauts would never make it back, is worth discussing. So are the changes since you were your children’s age. Note that everyone in Mission Control is a white male (and they all smoke all the time). They are amazed that a computer is small enough to fit into one room. And you may have to explain why adults who watch the movie laugh when the engineers take out their slide rules — for kids today, they are more exotic than an abacus.

For the third time in a row, Disney departs from its traditional animation release formula with this non-musical, intense-action adventure (rated PG for violence) about the search for the legendary city that mysteriously disappeared in ancient times.

Michael J. Fox appealingly provides the voice of Milo Thatch, a scholar and linguist who dreams of realizing his late grandfather’s quest to find Atlantis. He works at Washington’s Smithsonian Institution, where he is relegated to the boiler room. A wealthy and eccentric friend of his grandfather’s offers to fund an expedition, and Milo finds himself on a submarine led by Commander Lyle T. Rourke (James Garner). The crew includes hundreds of sailors led by Helga, a sultry mercenary (Claudia Christian); Sweet, a genial half-black, half-Native American doctor (Phil Morris); Audrey, a teenaged Latina mechanic (Jacqueline Obradors); Vinnie, a demolitions expert (Don “Father Guido Sarducci” Novello); Mrs. Packard, an unflappable, chain-smoking communications officer (gravel-voiced Florence Stanley); and the Mole, a geologist who loves dirt (Corey Burton).

They set off on a journey reminiscent of “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea,” culminating in a ferocious battle with the Leviathan, a mechanical sea monster that destroys the ship and kills most of the crew. Those who are left struggle through every obstacle imaginable but finally make it to Atlantis, where they meet Kida, a Pocahantas-style princess (Cree Summer) who speaks every language and is thousands of years old. She wants to make friends with the strangers, but her father wants them killed, so no one else will ever find them. Milo helps Princess Kida uncover the secret source of her country’s power but another threat appears – it turns out that Rourke and the others are only there to loot Atlantis. Milo has to find a way to save the place that has become his real home.

Parents should know that this movie is more intense and scary than the usual Disney release, with lots of (highly anachronistic) dive-bombing planes, lots of guns, a huge robot monster, fire, and the death of hundreds of anonymous sailors. Characters are mean to each other and some betray each other. Major characters are in peril and some are killed. One character is a chain-smoker, and there is a joke about whiskey, one about sleeping in the nude, and a whoopee-cushion gag. Milo becomes seasick. The movie does a good job of showing an inter-racial cast working well together, and there are both male and female good guys and bad guys.

Families should talk about the rise and fall of cultures over time, and how the study of history is essential in keeping a culture alive. Kids might want to learn more about the legends of Atlantis and read about the Greek Island of Santorini, which may be the source for some of them. Families might also want to talk about some of the anachronisms and plot holes in the movie. A key element of the plot involves a reference in an ancient document to Iceland, not Ireland, which, of course, had different names and were spelled with different alphabets thousands of years ago. The technology is also inaccurate – we are willing to suspend belief for Jules Verne-style science fiction machinery, but this features airplanes and trucks as commonplace items.

Families who enjoy this movie will also enjoy “The Thief and the Cobbler” – the character of the thief (voice of Jonathan Winters) may have inspired this movie’s Mole.