the little Princess

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Movie
German title the little Princess
Original title The Little Princess
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1939
length approx. 93 minutes
Age rating FSK 0
Rod
Director Walter Lang
script Ethil Hill ,
Walter Farris
production Darryl F. Zanuck ,
Gene Markey
for 20th Century Fox
music Charles Maxwell ,
Cyril J. Mockridge ,
Herbert W. Spencer ,
Samuel Pokrass
camera Arthur C. Miller ,
William V. Skall
cut Louis R. Loeffler
occupation

The Little Princess is a literary film adaptation from 1939 based on the children's book Sara, the Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett . Child star Shirley Temple plays the lead role , directed by Walter Lang .

action

The rich Captain Crewe is said to be serving for Great Britain in the Second Boer War . So he enrolls his daughter Sara and her pony at Miss Minchin's girls' school. She quickly made friends there, many students, but also the young teacher Hamilton and the servant Rose. In the course of the film, these two become a couple and get married. Sara also hears good news from the war and hopes her father will come home soon. But when Miss Minchin has a big birthday party, the news arrives that Captain Crewe has died and his property has been confiscated. Now Sarah herself has to work as a servant in the school where she was once a student. At the same time she befriends the servant Ram Dass.

The work is difficult for Sara and she sneaks off to veteran hospitals. Miss Minchin notices Sara's departure and follows her with the help of the police. In the hospital she meets Queen Victoria , who prompts her to look for her father. At first you actually don't find anyone, but on the run from Miss Minchin, Sara escapes into a room in which of all people lies her father. His identity was previously unclear as the only word he spoke was "Sara". In the final scene, Sara can be seen helping her father stand while Queen Victoria walks by in a parade.

backgrounds

  • The film cost a total of one million US dollars, which was well above the targeted budget. There had to be B. scenes are re-shot, which cost around 300,000 dollars. This made it not only the first color film, but also the most expensive film with Shirley Temple in the lead role.
  • There are some clear differences to the novel: there are new characters and events created and the reference to the Boer War is missing in the novel as well. The ending is also very different.
  • The film also became Shirley Temple's last hit. The film The Blue Bird tried to show her in the role of the naughty girl the next year, but it flopped. At the same time there was the rise of Judy Garland through the film The Wizard of Oz , in which Temple was supposed to play the main role.
  • Since the studio failed to renew the copyright, the film has been in the public domain since 1968 , so the film can be legally downloaded and viewed for free.

reception

The little princess received mostly good reviews when it was released. The industry journal Variety thought the film was "sugar-sweet", but after accepting it, the film would be consistently acceptable. In 1983, Janet Maslin found the film "charming". She concluded that the ending was very predictable, but just as touching. The Lexicon of International Films wrote: “ Film adaptation of a sentimental-romantic novel. A typical Shirley Temple film from the thirties. "

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Variety.com: Review: 'The Little Princess'
  2. ^ The New York Times: The Little Princess
  3. ↑ The little princess at two thousand and one