If you have a kid, you’re going to have to sit through a lot of crappy movies with them. This is a column from a dad’s perspective on whether you’ll be able to stand watching a movie without fashioning a noose or not, and if your child will try to stab you after it’s over.

Cinderella (1950)

Synopsis: Cinderella’s dad marries a horrible woman for some reason, then he up and dies and Cinderella becomes a slave to her evil stepmother and horrible stepsisters.

Would you be able to sit through it?: I don’t see why not, although after the third time or so you’ll look for something else to do while your kid watches it, like knit me some socks.

Any scary/violent parts?: Right after some heavy cigar smoking, the king repeatedly tries to decapitate the duke with a huge sword. The evil stepmother sitting in the shadows with her a-hole cat could make your kid nervous about going to bed.

Where the REAL magic happens in this movie.

Anything that will screw up your kid’s head?: Nothing really traumatizing in this, except your daughter may try to get mice to make clothes for her.

Any lessons to be learned?: Hmm, don’t be a jerk, I guess?

Recommended age: 3. This is a pretty tame and simple movie. The story’s not going to go over your kid’s head or anything.

Rent it, buy it or avoid it?: If you have a daughter, you pretty much have to buy it, since it’s the quintessential princess movie. It’s a timeless classic with a beautiful maiden, a handsome prince, talking animals, lovely songs and black magick. Not a great message for little girls, though: If life has you down, wait around and wish, do nothing to better your situation yourself, and hopefully you’ll be pretty enough to catch the eye of a prince. Ugh. And Cinderella was pretty much just going to off herself after her wicked stepsisters tore up her dress if the Fairy Godmother hadn’t stepped in and used her dark arts. Seriously, why didn’t Cinderella just leave the house? She was pretty, she could have worked in a shop somewhere and went after some nobleman. And really, the prince just falls for her because she’s a hot piece, and the king is eager to seem them married just so she can pop out some grandkids. But this was 1950, and nobody expected a positive female message to go beyond, “You don’t have to scrub the windows anymore!”

There are actually a couple of sequels to this that makes Cinderella less of a meek damsel in distress (the second one is just meh but the third one is pretty decent, it’s kinda like Timecop). So overall it’s kind of mandatory that you watch it, just make sure you watch something like The Princess and the Frog too so your little girl knows she needs to work to achieve her dreams instead of just dreaming them. But being pretty doesn’t hurt.