The Blue Bird (1940)

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Movie
Original title The Blue Bird
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1940
length 83 minutes
Rod
Director Walter Lang
script Ernest Pascal ,
Walter Bullock
production Gene Markey ,
Darryl F. Zanuck ,
for 20th Century Fox Film Corp.
music Alfred Newman
camera Arthur C. Miller ,
Ray Rennahan
cut Robert Bischoff
occupation

The Blue Bird is an American fantasy film from 1940 directed by Walter Lang . The siblings Mytyl ( Shirley Temple ) and Tyltyl are sent on a journey into the past, the present and the future by the fairy Berylume, where they hope to find the blue bird of happiness.

The script is based on Maurice Maeterlinck's play L'Oiseau bleu ( The Blue Bird ) , published in Moscow in 1908 .

action

The story takes place in a small village in Germany during the Napoleonic Wars . The siblings Mytyl and Tyltyl are the children of a woodcutter.

After Mytyl and Tyltyl have caught a very rare blue shimmering bird in the royal forest around Christmas time, which is said to have special powers, little Mytyl stubbornly refuses to bring this bird to her sick friend Angela Berlingot. When the family is having dinner, Mytyl complains to the parents that they are so poor and not doing as well as other families. The parents call her to order and try to convey the values ​​an intact family offers. It seems that her egoism has consequences, because shortly afterwards a messenger arrives with a draft for her father, who now has to go to war.

After Mytyl falls asleep, she dreams of the fairy Berylume, who wants her to find the shy blue bird of happiness together with her brother Tyltyl. In the dream, the fairy Berylume Tylette, the deceitful cat of the family and the loyal family dog ​​Tylo, helps to human form and language. From a small lantern she conjures up a light fairy who shows the small group the way with her magical light. Their search for the blue bird takes children, animals and fairies first into the past. In the cemetery, Mytyl and Tyltyl meet their deceased grandparents, who wake up and happily greet their grandchildren. In the past, however, the children did not find the blue bird. Tylette encourages the children to continue their search in the present, where people indulge in luxury. Especially Tylette likes it exceptionally well with Mrs. and Mr. Luxury, but there are often arguments between the siblings and they feel increasingly lonely in the big house where nobody really has time for each other. They soon realize that happiness is not synonymous with luxury and wealth. With the help of their dog Tylo they try to escape the abundance. Tylette wants to thwart this, however, and incites the trees to frighten the children so that they turn back. The trees then conspire with the wind and the fire and incite them to kill the children. In the subsequent storm, which leads to a huge fire, it hits Tylette, while the children can escape with Tylo in order to get to the realm of the future, where they might find something there, and to discover the blue bird. In the future, the world's unborn children are waiting for their birth and Mytyl and Tyltyl also meet their future sister, who has not yet been born. A golden ship with silver sails will bring them back to earth.

When the children wake up and see the mother and then also learn that a truce has been declared and the father has come home, they are overjoyed. And, oh wonder, Tylette too, is back, which is why Mytyl remarks that a cat also has seven lives. And the blue bird, she already has one, as Mytyl finally realizes. Purified and full of sincere joy, she brings him to Angela, who is immediately cured of her illness as if by a miracle. When Angela strokes the bird, it flies away. Mytyl assures the friend that it doesn't matter, because now they are able to find him again.

Production and Background

In addition to the studios of 20th Century Fox, according to the industry magazine The Hollywood Reporter , recordings were also made in Lake Arrowhead, California . The opening sequence of The Blue Bird is in black and white, the dream sequence and the rest of the film in color. The film premiered simultaneously on January 15, 1940 in San Francisco , New York , Boston and Detroit .

Originally, the cast list for 20th Century Fox saw Bobs Watson for the role of Tyltyl, Gene Lockhart for Tyl's father, Joan Davis as Tylette, Jessie Ralph as Angela's mother, Anita Louise as a figure of light, Zeffie Tilbury as a grandmother, George Barbier as a grandfather Andy Devine as "Cold in Head". Burton Churchill was also up for grabs. A newspaper article of the time reported that fifteen stages were needed for the various recordings and that the scenes that play in the red room were particularly difficult as far as the Technicolor process was concerned. According to the Hollywood Reporter , the film is said to have had a budget of $ 2,000,000. The Walt Disney Company is also said to have shown interest in the story based on Maurice Maeterlinck's stage work of the same name.

This film adaptation is considered 20th Century Fox's answer to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's film The Wizard of Oz , but could not even come close to its success, and marked the end of the previously untouchable star position of Shirley Temple. The audience didn't want to see Temple as the disagreeable child she embodies, at least at the beginning of the film. Gale Sondergaard was originally traded as the wicked witch in The Wizard of Oz , but then took on the role of the glamorous cat Tylette in The Blue Bird . The blue bird kept in an aviary cost $ 50 a day. Shortly after the film was finished, he flew away.

Four-year-old Caryll Ann Ekelund, who plays a tiny role in the film, died shortly after filming from the effects of burns that she sustained on Halloween when her costume caught fire. She was buried in the little dress she wore in the movie.

Further films

A French film adaptation dated 1908. In 1918 the material was filmed by Maurice Tourneur for the Famous Players-Lasky Corp with Tula Belle and Robin MacDougall and in 1976 by George Cukor with Elizabeth Taylor , Jane Fonda and Ava Gardner in a Russian-American co -Production. Another film adaptation, this time Belgian, entitled Blue Bird , was made in 2011 and directed by Gust Van Den Berghe.

Soundtrack
  • O Come Little Children , traditional tune, arranged by Edward B. Powell and Frank Tresselt
  • Lay Dee O , traditional tune, sung by Shirley Temple

criticism

Frank S. Nugent reviewed for the New York Times and found that the film only showed an abridged version of Maeterlinck's play and put Shirley Temple in the foreground. The film is not too frightening in the cemetery scenes or during the forest fire, which, by the way, is wonderfully filmed and inspires the imagination. If the rest of the film had that quality, Mr. Disney's crown of imagination might have been compromised.

Dave Sindelar from the Movie of the Day Archive Featuring Ignatz and Rumsford was of the view that Shirley Temple did with this film compared to the, Wizard of Oz 'the worse business. The film adaptation lacks “energy” and “ingenuity”. Sindelar also found that the best scene was that of the forest fire and complained that the only interesting character, the cat played by Gale Sondergaard, was killed in the process .

The critics of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops found that the film offers colorful allegorical settings , but that the originally imaginative narrative in the film spreads little charm and falls short of the imagination .

Awards

1941 received The Bluebird two nominations for the Oscar , once in the category "Best Cinematography in a color film" ( Arthur C. Miller and Ray Rennahan ), the second in the category "Best Visual Effects" ( Fred Sersen and Edmund H. Hansen ). The Oscar for "Best Camera (Color Film)" went to Georges Périnal for the fantasy and adventure film The Thief of Baghdad and that for "Best Visual Effects" to Lawrence W. Butler and Jack Whitney for the film The Thief of Baghdad .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Blue Bird (1940) - Screenplay Info. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  2. ↑ a b c The Blue Bird (1940) - Notes. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  3. ↑ The Blue Bird (1940) - Original Print Info. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  4. ↑ The Blue Bird (1940) - Trivia. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  5. ↑ The Blue Bird (1940) at kindertrauma.com (English). Retrieved January 21, 2014.
  6. ↑ Caryll Ann Ekelund at findagrave.com (English). Retrieved January 21, 2014.
  7. ^ The Blue Bird (1908). In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  8. ^ The Blue Bird (2011). In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved December 15, 2019 .
  9. ^ Frank S. Nugent: The Blue Bird (1940) Fantasy Comes a Trip in Miss Temple's 'Blue Bird' at the Hollywood In: The New York Times, January 20, 1940 (English). Retrieved January 21, 2014.
  10. ↑ Dave Sindelar: The Blue Bird (1940). In: Fantastic Movie Musings and Ramblings. July 2, 2002, accessed December 15, 2019 .
  11. ↑ The Blue Bird (1940) at old.usccb.org. (English). Retrieved January 21, 2014.