Many computer DVD drives let you change the region setting a few times before the configuration gets locked in.

Region coding is not the only issue in playing foreign DVDs to an American TV. Most European discs use the PAL video standard, which American sets can't decode. Some zone-free DVD players can handle that conversion, but I think some can't. If you want to use your laptop computer to play PAL DVDs onto an American TV set, one solution is to run the signal through a standards-conversion VCR on the way to the TV.

As for kid-friendly movies.. Come to think of it, most of the films I've seen in Spanish don't really fit the bill, except for the occasional Castilian-dubbed version of a Disney cartoon.

There seem to be a flood recently of inexpensive DVDs of Spanish films including classics like Berlanga's "Placido" at stores like Media Markt, FNAC, Madrid Rock, and even the various hypers. The price can be as low as 5 or 6 Euros. Just be sure that they are marked as "all-region" or that you have a "region-free" DVD player that can ideally also convert PAL to NTSC (the US TV standard) as necessary. I kicked myself when I saw that "Abre los Ojos" was on sale here for about 6 Euros when I had thought I had gotten a great bargain back in the States at 10 dollars. (But of course, the U.S. version is Region 1, NTSC, and has English subtitles.)

...And runs at the original projection speed.

For technical reasons, movies are usually sped up by about 4% when they're mastered onto a PAL tape or disc, whereas NTSC video recordings can easily use the original framerate. Oh, the useless trivia one picks up!

As for subtitles, all the Spanish films I've bought on Region 2 DVDs have had English titles. But then, they were all filmed in Catalan, so they're probably not typical cases. I quite enjoyed Ventura Pons' "Anita no perd el tren" ("Anita Takes a Chance"). It's hardly kiddie fare, but it's much easier going than Pons' heavier films.